Whilst I Linger On Top of the Land
by PencilMonkeyGaiden
Summary: You'll see London, you'll see France, you'll see Taylor Hebert ruling the wizards and witches of Europe with an iron fist and innumerable insects. (Which includes ants, and not just for the sake of rhyming.) ... [AKA Space Whale Patronus Chums]
1. Meeting the Neighbors

**Whilst I Linger On Top of the Land**

Summary:  
You'll see London, you'll see France, you'll see Taylor Hebert ruling the wizards and witches of Europe with an iron fist and innumerable insects. (Which includes ants, and not just for the sake of rhyming.)  
(AKA **Space Whale Patronus Chums** )

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 **Chapter 1 - Meeting the Neighbors**

Yet another soul-sucking monstrosity drifted past the bars to my cell. I yawned.

It screeched with a voice like a thousand cracked nails being scraped, with great force, down across Satan's blackboard. Lacking the energy for a more creative comeback, I settled for flipping it a lazy middle finger.

I thought for a moment, then decided against blowing a raspberry at it. Being imprisoned in a magical penitentiary that employed flying, un-living violations to the Geneva convention, it was anybody's guess if and when we'd be fed and watered. Just to be on the safe side, I needed to conserve fluids.

The Dementor snarled and gurgled, gripping the bars with both of its scabrous hands. White fractal patterns of crystalline frost promptly bloomed at a swift pace, spreading across the metal bars from the creature's fisted claws. The hood of its tattered dark cloak leaned closer, as it pressed its head between the bars. It howled some more. With a detached sense of vague, academic curiosity, I noted that the monster's screams never got any less terrifying, even after several cumulative hours' worth of exposure to the noise.

Somehow, its rasping breath reminded me of Sophia, barely a step behind me with her goons from Winslow's track team closing in, the sound of desperate gulps of air wheezing in and out of my labored lungs mingling with the jeering calls of my pursuers.

Looking at the Dementor's black cloak brought back memories of Emma, of days spent laughing with my best friend and sister in all but blood, as we played dress-up and make-believe, taking turns being Alexandria in our games of capes-and-villains; memories that had long since been tainted and ruined by what came after.

The Dementor's smell made me think of the Locker.

I pursed my lips, idly scratching my nose. "...Do you mind if I call you Nigel? That's a proper British name, right?"

The monster paused. Then, it lunged at me, no doubt eager to lacerate me with its cracked claw-like nails. It wasn't able to reach me past the bars, but it did manage to make itself look like it was throwing a tantrum, flailing its arms at me a bit.

"It's just, I'm pretty sure I've seen you float past before, and it'd be a lot easier to tell you guys apart if you had names, y'know?" I scraped off some of the mucus that had caked on my upper lip, after my earlier bouts of screaming and sobbing, and flicked the booger at the Dementor. "Hey, do you have a face under that hood, or just some kind of emaciated skull business going on? Picking your nose must be murder, with fingernails like those."

The ghoulish creature ululated a lilting screech, managing to sound both confused, offended, and horrifying; it seemed profoundly upset that I wasn't currently weeping on the floor in the fetal position. Frankly, it had managed to cram an impressive amount of emotion in such a simple, albeit bladder-loosening sound.

These psychopomps were more expressive than people gave them credit for.

Shaking its head, the Dementor waved its stick-thin arm at me in dismissal and drifted away, heading down the corridor.

"So, is that a 'no' to Nigel, then?" I called after it. "Would you prefer to be Desmond?"

I was answered with silence, or as close to it as this place ever got. There were faint echoes of distant moans and bickering from other inmates, but I'd been placed in a cell with very few immediate neighbors. I'd only heard a few angry mutters from them, thus far. Since every prisoner had their magic stick confiscated, or in some cases even snapped in half, I wasn't too concerned about random curse words. From what I'd observed, the members of this secret society of British Myrddin-wannabes needed to use wands in order to activate their Striker and Blaster powers.

Well, either that, or they all got so caught up in their wizard cosplay, they were loath to break character.

Resting my chin on top of my folded hands, and bracing my elbows against my knees, I tried to make myself comfortable where I sat on my cot. Then, I sighed and took another look around my current accommodations. Bare stone walls, cold and clammy from the North Sea air. It was a bad idea to try leaning against them, if you were hoping to relax and maybe even avoid hypothermia; I'd learned that the hard way. Thankfully, my cell didn't have a window. These people didn't seem to have discovered the magic of insulation, or they just didn't want to waste it on convicted felons. Getting a room with a view in this place meant getting enough natural air conditioning that even a polar bear would complain.

The cell itself was a small marvel of architectural design, emphasis on "small". It was, at the same time, both spartan and cramped. Roughly square, with three walls built of stone slabs and one made up of a simple line of tarnished metal bars facing the hallway, it was large enough to make you want to pace restlessly, yet small enough that you wouldn't be able.

I had an old, worn cot with a grimy bag of lumps that might once have been a mattress, which I was currently using as a seat. The other item of furniture in the cell was a bucket; the - thankfully faint - odor clued me in to its purpose. Since it didn't actually contain any visible residue from previous residents, I held hope it would be cleaned at some point, or at least emptied.

So, terrible room, worse roommates. One-half star. Would not sign up to get incarcerated again.

Still, as dreadful as this place might be, it could be worse. It _had_ been worse, for the first few eternities. Hours. Whatever. I'd never been particularly religious, but I'd heard the locals use the names of famous mages as expletives, in the same way I might say "God dammit"; with nothing better to do with my time at the moment, I spent a minute praying to Merlin, Morgana, and Mickey the Wizard's Apprentice that the guards wouldn't think to renew whatever technique they'd used to mess with my powers.

Speaking of which, my swarm sense was telling me that my neighbor across the hall had woken up, or maybe they just stopped pretending to be asleep.

It was odd, though; they had plenty of fleas and other parasites on their body, which was hardly surprising in a place like this, but the bugs had shifted position in a weird way. Not just from the person moving their limbs, but like a Changer doing a shape-shift. I got the impression they might even have had a tail, before they changed; it wagged a few times when the Dementor left.

Either way, my neighbor seemed more active now than at any point since I arrived. They crawled out from under the cot in their cell, where they'd lain curled up until now, and shuffled towards the bars blocking off the cell from the corridor.

They plonked down on the floor with a sigh, sitting with their legs stretched out in the hallway and leaning their upper body against the bars. Judging by the matted beard, the gaunt figure was probably male. There was a hint of dark eyes lurking behind the long tangles of his black hair, staring at me with surprising intensity.

"So, whose feathers did you ruffle, girl?" The rasping voice wasn't ominous like the Dementors' cadaverous rattle; it just sounded hoarse from prolonged disuse.

I tilted my head to the side, giving him a flat stare. "That's not my name."

His eyes glittered, and his ill-kempt beard twisted in what might have been a smile, or a wry grin. "Oh, I do apologize! You must be the honorable Mrs. Nigel Desmond, then."

That actually startled a laugh out of me. When I sensed the temperature start dropping and heard a distant yowl, I hurried to shove my amusement out into my swarm.

"Nah," I said "He wanted to kiss on the first date, and I'm not that kind of girl."

He grimaced. "Sounds about right. Those Dementors always had trouble taking 'no' for an answer." Scratching his beard, he shifted his position a little, crossing his legs while keeping them sticking out past the bars; after a brief struggle, he settled for crossing his ankles, in a position that didn't look too much more uncomfortable than any other available seating option.

"My guess is that, uh..." He scratched his forehead, then snapped his fingers. "A black cat crossed your path, so you Crucio'ed it to death, and then kicked the corpse in a ditch. But later, it turned out to have been a Wizengamot member's prize Kneazle, so they chucked you in here."

I gaped at him. "...Okay, I understood maybe three-quarters of the words you just used, but based on the parts that I did get, I'm gonna go with: 'Hell, no'."

"Oh, woe betide me!" He leaned backwards forty-five degrees, bracing himself against the bars with his legs to keep from toppling over. He clasped one hand to his chest, and rested the back of his other hand against his forehead. "What will my silver tongue avail me, if my teeth are rotting away and slurring my speech?" Another Dementor's cry wiped the grin from his face, and made him slump back to his former pose.

"Your pronunciation is fine," I said, rolling my eyes.

His beard twitched, perhaps hiding a crooked smile, as he rapped his knuckles against the stone floor. "Well, I wouldn't be the first bloke to end up _prone_ from _unseat-ation_."

"I meant, your _diction_!" I pointed an angry finger at him. "And don't you dare comment on that one!"

He clapped both hands over his mouth and raised his eyebrows.

Sighing, I rolled my eyes and lowered my hand again. "I can hear you just fine, it's the words themselves that I didn't recognize."

He blinked at me. "Oh? Which ones?"

"Um, I know about the Wizengamot, a little..." I grimaced at that memory. The sham trial hadn't been the absolute worst moment of my life, so the Dementors didn't evoke the memory of it all that often when they visited, but it was hardly a pleasant experience, either.

I shook my head. "Anyway... What does 'Kneazle' and, um, 'Crucio' mean?"

"...Really? Those stumped you?" He quirked an eyebrow me. "Must have been a rather lackluster education in Dark magic you received, if they never even mentioned the Cruciatus Curse." He wagged a finger at me. "You're a colonial, right? That accent is a bit of a giveaway. Did you go to Salem?"

I shook my head. "I haven't attended any magic schools, Dark or otherwise. I'm not even a wizard, or a witch, or a warlock, or... Whatever other titles for magic-users start with W." I raised a finger. "I _am_ from America, though. That's what you meant by 'colonial', right? So, one point to you."

His jaw had dropped further and further during my explanation. Now, he gaped at me, incredulity plain on the few bits of his face that weren't covered by unwashed black hair. "...You're a Muggle?! How in Mordenkainen's name did you end up in Azkaban? Wait, how are you even conscious, if you're a Muggle?!" His face looked decidedly pale with shock, now. "The Dementors' aura should have knocked you out completely! I've had over a decade's worth of exposure to build up a resistance to them, plus a trick or two up my sleeves, and I can just barely cope... But you!" He flailed his arm at me. "Look at you! You've only been here a couple of hours, and you're already able to banter again! Banter took place, just now! I heard it happen, I was there! I was the banter-ee!"

I folded my arms, and glared. "Hey, I'm tougher than I look, alright?"

He flapped his hand at me in a dismissive wave. "Oh, that much is obvious. My point still stands, though." He pointed a skinny finger at me, that looked to be mostly skin and bone and accusations. "I suspected you might have built up tolerance to the Dementors from a previous visit. Young as you are, it's just barely possible that you could be a repeat offender, someone who'd visited this fine institution before, and couldn't get enough of the comfy rooms and haute cuisine. But then-"

His paranoid rant was interrupted by the sound of cackling laughter. "Poor old Silly-Woose! Don't hurt your widdle mind, trying to understand what's going on!"

The man across from me sighed. "Speaking of haute cuisine... Allow me to introduce my entirely unattractive cousin, Mrs. Bellatrix Lestrange-née-Black."

I learned forward to get a better look. In the cell diagonally across the hallway from mine, adjacent to the black-haired man's cell, was a woman with long, curly black hair. According to my swarm sense, we were the only three people in this corridor. I'd been aware of her presence before this, of course, thanks to the bugs I'd directed to roam the prison so I could attempt mapping the place and its residents. This was the first time she'd talked above a low murmur, though. She'd been pacing in her cell, to the minimal extent that this was possible, and occasionally waving her arms; I got the impression that she'd been scraping her fingernails down the walls, and raking them through her long mane of bushy hair. Looking at her, there was a certain similarity between her features and those of my conversation partner, but it was difficult to tell how much was family resemblance, and how much was just the thematic commonalities of "really filthy" and "needs a good meal or twelve".

Her eyes were striking, though; violet, and violent, gleaming irises filled with something that made me think of rabid dogs - or Sophia.

Still, like Mom would say: Good manners cost nothing. I waved at her. "Uh... Hello?"

She snarled, spittle flying as she spoke. "Liar! You can fool my idiot cousin, but I'm not that gullible!" She started rocking from side to side, shifting her weight from one foot to the other while simpering at me in a sing-song voice. "Oh, I'm just a poor widdle Muggle, 'ere in Azkaban! I ain't bothered by the Dementors, but I ain't a witch, neither!" She giggled. "Silly widdle spy, with a silly widdle story! If you're going to snoop on me, try to wheedle out the Dark Lord's secrets, at least make the effort to come up with a believable lie!" She spat on the floor between our cells; if she'd had the angle for it, I'm sure she would have aimed at me.

The gaunt man barked a short laugh. "Oh, Bella! If she was trying to ingratiate herself with you and your Dark Tosser, don't you reckon she would've pretended to be a Dark witch, herself?"

Bellatrix bared her teeth in something that vaguely resembled a smile. "That's what they'd want you to think! But I know what they think they know that I know, so: No!" She raised her right index finger. "She pretends to resist the Dementors, to make me think: Dark magic!" She raised her left index finger, holding her hands so the two extended fingers were parallel. "But she pretends to be a Muggle, to make me want to kill her!"

Mimicking her pose, the disheveled man raised both his index fingers. He looked between them for a few seconds. Then, he smiled, and lifted his hands, pointing his index fingers at his temples and doing twirling motions. "

"What a triffic idea! Why, I'm sure people would stand in line to get killed by you."

She grabbed the bars to her cell, looking like she'd rather wrap her bony fingers around his throat. "Imbecile! She's obviously hoping I'd gloat about the Dark Lord's secret plans, before snuffing her worthless life! Then, she'd just... Portkey away to safety! Or something!"

I cleared my throat, loudly. The man across the hallway paused, and turned to glance at me. He'd been in the middle of thumbing his nose at Bellatrix, and blowing a raspberry; clearly, he wasn't concerned about rationing his fluids. "Quick question: If she's a Lestrange, and used to be a Black, and you're related to her... What does that make you? A Lestrange, or a Black?"

It was amusing to watch them both recoil, as if they'd been equally offended by that question.

The scruffy-looking man answered me first. "I'm a Black, of course! I may be a Pureblood by birth, but I would never stoop so low as to be born as a Lestrange!"

The woman shouted some more, defending the good - or at least odd - name of the Lestrange family and its long line of homicidal Dark wizards, but I tuned her out. "What about those other words you mentioned? Kneazle, and Crucio, or Cruciatus, or whatever?"

He started to reply, but Bellatrix beat him to it. "Don't worry, widdle Miss Pretend-Muggle... As soon as I get my hands on a wand, I'll be more than happy to demonstrate any torture curses you want!"

I scooted a little further away from her on my cot. "Ohh-kay... That answers one of my questions, I suppose. What about Kneazle? Is that something awful and disgusting, too?"

Shrugging, the emaciated man grinned at me. "If you're a dog person, sure," he said. "Kneazles are a breed of magical cats; a bit bigger than a domestic housecat, and almost as smart as a person."

Bellatrix chortled. "Which doesn't mean much, if the person is you, Sirius!"

"Hang on..." I studied the sunken features of the dark-haired man more closely. "Your name is Sirius Black? Isn't he supposed to be some sort of..." Suddenly, his resemblance to Bellatrix was far easier to spot. "...Mass murderer?"

He glowered at me, straightening his pose to look more, well... Imposing. "I. Was. Framed!"

The ensuing rant was enlightening, at least. I'd heard a few horror stories about Sirius Black before, in what he called "the Muggle papers", but was really mostly television and internet research. The true story, according to him, was far stranger. In between his shouts and anguished sobs, I learned about the Potters, and Lupin, and Pettigrew, who Sirius seemed to hate even more than he despised You-Know-Who. It took a little effort to make him understand that, no, I don't know who, so referring to someone by that title doesn't help me understand what you're talking about. Also, calling them He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, instead, isn't really an improvement; frankly, it's something of an oxymoron, since He-Who-Etc is a nickname in and of itself, and therefore a contradiction in terms.

Then I had to explain 'oxymoron', so I guess we both learned something today. Unless he was just winding me up, of course.

Eventually, I discovered that He-Who-Has-Too-Many-Hyphens, also known as You-Know-Who, was the same person as Bellatrix's dear Dark Lord. Pettigrew was apparently a Peter, and a Wormtail. Sirius spoke to me of Fidelius charms, and betrayal, and the Killing Curse, and treachery. Words like "two-faced", and "double-crossing", and "heartless backstabbing vermin", all put in an appearance, as well. It might just be a result of hindsight being twenty/twenty, but it really didn't seem surprising to me that you couldn't trust a guy when even his childhood friends called him "Wormtail".

Once Sirius ran out of steam, Bellatrix took over. Unlike her cousin, she didn't try to defend herself, or find excuses for her actions. She just bragged; proudly, and at great length.

"...Then, after Frank had soiled himself," she chuckled. "I gave sweet Alice a widdle more attention. She'd already started drooling, and her wuvly Blood Twaitor eyes had rolled back in her head, but I thought I could probably get another two or three decent screams out of her, if I just-"

"Stop!" I held my hands in front of me, as if I could ward off the grisly images by force. My hands lowered when I noticed the smug, triumphant look on Bellatrix's face. No doubt, she thought her detailed descriptions of gory sadism had turned my stomach, and that was why I'd cried out.

I needed to change that impression, even if it was accurate; Bellatrix clearly wasn't the type of person you wanted to show your weaknesses. She'd probably take notes, for future reference.

"Um," I said. "Didn't you swear a solemn oath, scant minutes ago, that you'd never tell me any of your Dark Lord's secrets?"

Her cruel frown turned upside down. This wasn't an improvement. "Aww, did the widdle Muggle understand all the big, scary words I'm using?" She shrugged. "So? What of it?"

I stared at her, trying to look bored and indifferent. "Well, wouldn't that list of secrets include your hard-earned knowledge of how to use the, uh, Cruciatus Curse to optimum effect?"

She opened her mouth. She closed it again. This pattern repeated a couple more times. Then, she growled at me, crossed her arms over her chest, and spun around to face the wall.

Sirius turned to look at me with a grin. "Right, then. Your turn to play storyteller."

"What?" I raised my hands as if to signal surrender, or harmlessness; neither of which applied to me at the moment, but hey, he might still buy the 'innocent teen' act. "Regardless of what you think of me, I actually try to avoid torturing people, or kicking cats, or what have you."

He rolled his eyes at me. "Fine, so you're not a kitten-punter, or a Crucia-tussler. What are you, then?" He shuffled around a little, flopping down on his stomach and resting his head in his hands, elbows braced against the floor, while kicking his feet in the air. "C'mon, girlfriend! Spill, spill, spill! Why'd they chuck you in here, huh? Huh?"

I huffed at him. "Seriously? Are you trying to turn this into a slumber party?"

"What?" He twitched his shoulders, probably trying and failing to shrug while slumped on the floor. "Don't you like slumber parties? We could paint each other's toe nails, after you tell us a scary story."

Eventually, he relented under my glare, and lay down completely flat, his limbs splayed out wide. "See? I'm just a harmless fur rug. You can talk freely now, oh hater of fun."

Bellatrix snorted, grumbling something about "Fake Dark Muggles who don't even wanna talk about the Cruciatus," before going back to muttering angry nonsense under her breath.

I shook my head at the absurdity of the situation. I wasn't going to tell them about why I disliked slumber parties, especially with Bellatrix reminding me of Sophia every few minutes; that being said, they'd shared their stories of how and why they'd been incarcerated. It was only fair for me to tell mine.

Besides, I bet they could just ask other people about it, if and when they got any visitors, or the guards checked up on us. My Kafkaesque farce of a trial had been fairly public.

I sat up straight on my cot, smiled, and waved at Sirius. By now, I'd gotten a pretty good handle on how much fun I could have before the Dementors took notice - or rather, how little. "Hi, I'm Taylor Hebert, and I, uh... I mind-controlled a woman. Once, by accident!"

Sirius tilted his head to the side, managing to convey his confusion while, presumably, giving his chin a break from digging into the hard stone floor where he lay, at the same time. "Really? One measly Imperius curse was enough to land you in the maximum-security section of Azkaban?" He tilted his head in the other direction. "Also, the Imperius curse? I thought you said you weren't a witch?"

Bellatrix kept her back to me, but judging by the way she froze up and stopped murmuring to herself, I suspected I'd gotten her full attention, now.

I rolled my eyes at him. "I'm not a witch. I'm a parahuman." Sirius just looked confused. "You know, a cape?"

His confusion gave way, but only to bewilderment. "Right, sure... Looks like its my turn to have my vocabulary expanded. What do you mean, you're a cape? I take it you're not talking about clothing, here?"

I opened my mouth to explain, then closed it again. He genuinely seemed not to know about parahumans. Come to think of it, none of the rest of these 'wizards' and 'witches' had called me a cape, or a villain, or anything like that. Even at my trial in their kangaroo court, they'd referred to me as a 'Dark witch'. I'd thought they were just super-dedicated to their cosplay, like Myrddin, but what if they weren't faking their ignorance? This whole secret society I'd stumbled across by accident, it seemed... Well, pretty darn secret. Secluded, even. Had they managed to hide from the world so well, they didn't even know about parahumans?

Boy, were they in for a nasty surprise, if one of the Endbringers decided to visit Britain.

...Wait, hadn't the Simurgh already attacked London or some place like that? How the heck had they managed to miss _that?_

Sirius watched me impatiently, while my thoughts raced.

"Um... My point is, I'm, uh... I'm an East Coast Enchantress."

I didn't want to unmask completely and show off all my capabilities to a couple of near-total strangers - at least one of which was a violent psychopath, and proud of it - but I'd probably need to display at least a little bit of 'magic' to make them believe my story. At this point, it was almost a stroke of good fortune that my swarm was so limited at the moment. Being trapped on a craggy, barren island in the middle of the North Sea, I'd only been able to scrounge up a few flies and roaches, a whole lot of fleas, ticks, and lice, and not much else.

Luckily, my powers didn't just affect bugs.

I swept out my arm like a conductor, right at the moment when a handful of crabs scuttled down the hallway and paused in front of my cell. Sirius watched, wide-eyed, as the crabs clambered on top of one another, forming a crabby pyramid. He grinned and applauded a little, when the crabs started dancing the can-can.

All the while, I twitched my fingers and waved my hands like a puppeteer pulling on invisible strings. If I wanted to conceal exactly what my power could do, it wouldn't hurt to make them think I needed gestures to exercise my control, like they seemed to rely on special sticks.

Plus, it was kinda fun, hamming it up.

Sirius scrutinized me more closely. "Wandless, non-verbal magic? Pretty bloody impressive." He ignored the angry noises from Bellatrix's cell, that grew louder at that comment, and pointed at my crab-show. "Doesn't seem like there's much difference between an enchantress and a witch, though."

I waggled ny eyebrows at him. "Of course there is! I told you it didn't start with a W, didn't I?"

Sirius had sat himself upright again. "So, you're an enchantress. From the distant shores of the New World, no less. What brings you to our quaint little neck of the woods, and who'd you have to Imperius to get to meet my charming self?"

He batted his eyelashes and tossed his matted, grimy hair over his shoulder, making me suspect that, cut off from the wider world though their society might be, Sirius must have watched a shampoo commercial at some point.

"Well... I suppose it started when Dad died..." I noticed that Bellatrix was watching me over her shoulder, and shook my head at her. "And no, I didn't kill him."

Her eager, shark-toothed grin dwindled into a frown, and she went back to sulking with her back turned and arms crossed.

"He worked down by the harbor, with the Dockworkers' Association," I continued. "Drowning accident, they said." Privately, I had my suspicions. Dad avoided talking about the murkier side of things when I was in the room, but I'd overheard a couple of arguments he'd had with Mom. I knew that some of the gangs wanted protection money. Dad had refused. Then, he'd died, in a tragic 'accident'. I wasn't sure if the cops were corrupt, or just too swamped with work to notice. In Brockton Bay, it could be either, or even both.

I picked at a loose thread on my sleeve. "Mom and I, we... Well, we tried to make things work. Just, keep going. For a while. But, uh... Eventually, she got a job offer in Britain, so we moved overseas." She'd had to pull a few invisible strings of her own, I knew, to get that job, but once she found out what Emma and Sophia had done, she wanted me as far away from that mess as possible.

Moving to another continent seemed a bit excessive, but I appreciated her effort.

It had been hard, leaving the house that had been our home all my life, but we gritted our teeth, and carried through. Mom wasn't making a lot of money, as an English professor and single parent, and we'd probably have had to sell the house, anyway, even if we'd stayed in the US.

From Sirius's expression, he'd likely noticed that I was leaving a lot out of my story, but he didn't comment, which I appreciated.

"Before we moved, I'd started, uh, training my gifts," I said. That much was true; my debut as a cape might also have been my closing night in Brockton Bay, but at least I'd gone out with one heck of a bang!

...Armsmaster got all the credit, though, but that was OK. The guy worked hard, he was a professional hero. I knew the truth, and so did he, and that was enough.

"After we got to Britain, I tried to... Well, help people, using my powers. It, uh... It didn't work quite as planned." I heard Bellatrix snigger. Jerk.

Sirius pursed his lips, tapping his chin with the nail on his thumb. "Ah. Is this the part with the Imperius curse?"

I began to nod, then shook my head. "Kinda? It wasn't a, uh, an Imperius, as such..." I sighed. "Have you heard of a reporter called Rita Skeeter?"

He waggled his hand. "Vaguely. The newspaper deliveries are a bit spotty, in here, but some of the hit-wizards and Aurors throw away a copy of the Daily Prophet, once in a while. She's a muckraker, tries to find dirt on everyone so she can smear it across the front page, right?"

"Pretty much," I nodded. "It's a long story, but, uh... I ended up mind-controlling her, by accident." It wasn't that much longer, really, but I didn't want to admit that my powers were limited to bugs, and didn't work on people. Thus, I left out the part about Skeeter having been transformed into a beetle, at the time. It had been pretty horrifying, suddenly noticing that one of the bugs in my swarm was thinking like a person.

"When I let her go, she called the, uh, Aurors. I got arrested." I'd probably have been able to put up a better fight, maybe even gotten away, if I wasn't busy freaking out about my bug minions possibly being Changers in disguise, at the time. I'd taken out eleven of them, but they were likely just rookies, or the magical equivalent of donut-munching rent-a-cops; their tactics had been abysmal, especially when you considered that they had access to a ridiculous number of grab-bag powers.

Sirius gave me a knowing look. "Let me guess: They didn't let you speak in your own defense, the trial was a foregone conclusion, and then they tossed you in here and threw away the key?"

"Yes! Exactly!" My hair whipped around with the force of my nodding. "That Skeeter woman's got blackmail material on all sorts of people! She convinced the Minister and the judges to sentence me to..." My voice cracked. "Well, this place."

This time, Sirius's smile didn't look sardonically amused; just sympathetic, and tired. "Look on the bright side: At least they put you in the worst part of the prison."

I glared at him. "...Yay. I'm so excited. See this face?" I pointed at my scowl, with my middle finger. "This is my happy face."

He actually laughed, the swine. "Think about it! Down in the low-security areas, where they put the small-time crooks and minor offenders?

offenders?" He waved at me. "And the offending minors, as well, when they feel the need to chuck a child in Azkaban? Well, the whole island is covered in Muggle-repelling wards, but the lower sections also have plenty of vermin-repelling and other critter-repelling charms. The Auror guards don't want rats nibbling at their packed lunches, y'see." He gestured at my crabs, who were taking a break from their Broadway performance. "You wouldn't be able to get your little friends in, down there. Up here, they don't bother with the animal-repelling spells, since they hope the fleas and lice will kill us by inches."

Watching him try to scratch the back of his head with his foot would normally have amused me. Right now, I just tried not to show the sensation of dread that was pooling in my stomach. The Aurors must have used those vermin-repelling 'spells' to keep me from swarming them with bugs, after they arrested me. Once I was in prison, the higher-ups must have assumed the local protection measures would keep me under control, and forgotten to inform the guards about it. I'd really lucked out with their lax containment protocol, but if somebody noticed the oversight...

I shivered, and not just from the cold draft.

I shook my head, trying to think of a distraction from these dismal thoughts. "Um... Do you know someone named Lucy Malloy?"

Sirius stopped his amateur contortionist routine, and rolled back around on the floor to face me. "Hmm... I knew a Ravenclaw called Lucinda Morton, when I was at school." He grinned, holding one hand to his mouth in a suggestive pose. "She's hard to forget, since she had this amazing technique w-"

"Nope!" I cried, sticking both fingers in my ears. "La-la-la! I can't hear youuu!"

He gave me an innocent look, like butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. At these frigid temperatures, that might even be true. "What? Do you have something against saxophonists?"

I huffed at him, rubbing my arms. All these terrible jokes were luring the Dementors closer, increasing the cold. "I just wanted to know about Malloy," I said, stressing the name.

"Because I heard the name from Rita Skeeter. Or, well, something similar. I kinda got the impression that this Lucy Malloy - or whatever the name was - that she's pretty close to the Minister, and was manipulating him, as well. Maybe she's..." I scowled at Sirius and his amused look. "Giving him private saxophone concerts. Eww. Anyway, if it wasn't for dear Lucy, I might have gotten a lighter sentence. Probably still would have ended up in Azkaban, just not the maximum security wing... So, by your logic, I guess I owe her a fruit basket, or maybe..." I glanced to the side. "Um, are you alright?"

Bellatrix had started laughing so hard, she was sprawled on the floor, making wheezing noises. "Oh, widdle old Lucius! Always making a mess of things, trying to be cunning!" She wiped away her tears, sobering quickly when a Dementor drifted through the hallway, warbling a shrill cry.

"Malfoy..." She hissed. "You'll get what's coming to you, filthy traitor. Once the Dark Lord returns, he'll..." She hunched over, wrapping her arms around her knees, and started muttering again.

"Lucius Malfoy, huh?" Sirius squinted at me. "Say, when did Skeeter tell you that name, exactly? Was it while you used your not-quite-Imperius on her? Because I doubt that she'd be throwing it around in casual conversation."

I rubbed the back of my neck. "During the, uh, trial... I wasn't controlling her again, I'd only done that once, by accident..." I couldn't have controlled Skeeter when I saw her in the Wizengamot chamber, even if I'd wanted to; she wasn't in her bug-form, then. I doubted she'd want to let her inner beetle out in public, if she used it to spy on people, like the world's tiniest paparazzi.

"...But I could hear some of... Some of her thoughts." And hadn't that been a fresh shock? Even when Skeeter was wearing her human form, my power still registered her as kinda-sorta-almost-bug-like; enough to let me listen to her surface thoughts, and give me a headache trying to parse the input.

Sirius was looking uneasy. "Are you saying that-"

"Enough!" Bellatrix whirled around and grabbed the bars to her cell, leaning towards me. "Imperius curses, Legilimency, resistance to Dementors... Do you really think I'd believe your feeble fibbing?" She sneered, looking me up and down. "A skinny wet-behind-the-ears slip of a girl, barely old enough to have taken her OWL exams, and yet you claim mastery of such a breadth of insidious and arduous Dark Arts?" She cackled and laughed, her voice loud and brittle. "Preposterous!"

"Are you sure you don't mean: Ex-posteriors?" Sirius stuck his head out between the bars, giving Bellatrix a toothy smile. "As in: Something you've pulled out of your backside? I'm sure you're an expert on that kind of thing, dear cousin... What with all the time you Death Eaters spent on your knees, when your Dark Lord asked you to-"

Bellatrix lunged at him, swiping a long-nailed hand through the air. With two sets of metal bars between them, it was a pretty futile gesture. "Silence, Blood Traitor! Man-children should neither be seen, nor heard!"

Sirius gasped, holding his hand in front of his mouth, wide-eyed. "Gosh! Should I be smelled, instead?" He scrambled to his feet, turned around, and bent over, aiming the seat of his raggedy pants in Bellatrix's direction. He started making a long, straining grunt: "Hrnnnggg...!"

"Alright, that's enough!" I clapped my hands, drawing their attention. Well, I got Bellatrix's attention, at least; Sirius was too busy yelping and squealing, and struggling to dislodge the crabs that were currently pinching his buttocks with every claw at their disposal.

Bellatrix sniggered as she watched. "Aww, how adowable! The widdle tiny OWL-y can make pwanks! She and the Blood Traitor would make such a cute couple!"

"Nah, I'm not interested in little kiddies," Sirius growled. He was rubbing his sore backside, alternating between glaring at the crabs marching out of his cell, and glaring at his cousin. "I leave that sort of thing to your Dark Lord. He's got quite an obsession with young boys, doesn't he?" Before Bellatrix could scream at him again, he barreled on, pointing at me. "Besides, I was thinking that you two Dark witches would want to team up. You'd make a right lovely pair, you would."

"Oh, puh-lease!" Bellatrix scoffed. "As if this tiny OWL-y could measure up to my standards. Why, she's never even tortured someone! She's never exulted in inflicting the deepest agony upon her enemies!"

I'm not sure why I didn't just keep quiet, at that point. Maybe I was tired from the constant strain of keeping the Dementors' influence at bay. Maybe it was because this psychotic murderess had inadvertently taken my Mom's favorite nickname for me, and turned it into something ugly and mean; she probably didn't even realize what she'd done, but it still reminded me of Emma.

"Oh, yeah?" I yelled at her. "The first time I was in a fight to the death, I beat a guy who was eight times my size - and I won by making his genitals rot off! Top that, asshole!"

They were both silent, at that. Sirius looked more horrified than at any point before; he was crossing his legs, possibly on reflex.

Bellatrix was stone-faced. She gripped the bars with both hands, leaning forward to rest her forehead against the cold metal. Slowly, her lips twisted into a smile; pure nightmare fuel. "Tell me... _Everything_ ," she breathed. Her legs were crossed, too, but her expression was excited and her voice was husky and oh god oh god that was probably because mentioning extreme violence had made her eww eww _eww_.

...Yeah, I definitely should have kept quiet.

.[swpc]. .[swpc]. .[swpc]. .[swpc]. .[swpc]. .[swpc].


	2. Pit Stop

**Whilst I Linger On Top of the Land**

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A/N:  
Decided to change the name of this story, since the previous title, _Space Whale Patronus Chums_ , ended up as too much of a goofy placeholder for how the tone of the story turned out. The new title, _Whilst I Linger On Top of the Land_ , is a quote from a song by H.P. Lovecraft (yes, really) that I've been saving for a special occasion. Feel free to abbreviate it as WILOTotL, if you wish; that makes it sound like a Mayan thundergod, or a jaguar-headed Aztec deity, which might make it even cooler.

A/N 2:  
Also, in case you're wondering: _Shep of the Painted Hills_ is, indeed, a real book. It's even been turned into a live-action movie, where poor Shep was replaced by canine super-star Lassie, presumably to draw in a bigger audience. If Sirius ever discovered that it existed, that book would probably become his favorite novel.

A/N 3:  
Also also, I realized that, in canon, Padfoot's Animagus form is evidently a black dog the size of a bear. Since I've already planned out the first couple dozen chapters, with Padfoot being merely a large dog, i.e. within normal size range for a domesticated canine, I'm gonna go ahead and contradict canon in this instance, because of reasons. Granted, it is pretty amusing to imagine a bear-sized dog, curled up inside a cell, occasionally opening a lazy eye to glare at the (comparatively) itty-bitty Dementors floating around. Sirius's hunt for Pettigrew would be so bereft of stealth, it'd turn into a Monty Python sketch; only, instead of a huge hedgehog wandering around Britain and shouting "Dinsdale!", it'd be a giant dog howling "Wormtail!"... Dang, it even _rhymes_.

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 **Chapter 2 - Pit Stop**

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I lifted my chin, letting the head waiter tuck a napkin into the collar of my shirt. The feel of the clean cotton fabric against my skin was glorious after languishing in jail for who-knew-how-long.

At a snap of my fingers, waiters number two through thirty-seven all stood to attention. "Garçon? I want you to bring the finest, the most expensive, and above all else..." I leaned forward a little, drawing out my next words. "The tastiest..."

There was a whimper from across the table.

"The most scrumptious..."

Low whimpers grew to a long, insistent moaning wail.

"The _yummiest_ victuals on your menu. The appetizer must be stomach-growl-inducing, the entrée should be of such unsurpassable deliciousness that even Scion himself would feel compelled to break his decades-long streak of near-total silence, just to burst into songs of praise."

The whimpers and groans had been replaced by the rhythmic thumping of someone beating their head against a wall.

"And the dessert..." Raising my fingertips to my pursed lips, I made a kissing noise and spread my fingers open, like I was miming a taste explosion. "Pure... Rapturous... _Bliss_."

While the throng of waiters rushed off to do my bidding, Sirius threw himself to the floor and started rolling around. He screamed, and howled, and beat his fists against the ground. He kicked his feet in the air whenever he rolled onto his stomach.

I folded my arms over my chest, and eyed the pathetic man-child with a haughty sniff. "Careful, Mr. Black," I said "If you keep acting like a toddler, all you'll have for dinner is gruel fit for babies."

"Evil!" Sirius blubbered at the top of his scratchy voice. "You're evil! Absolute evil! The most vile, despicable, atrocious bitch of a witch that ever misdid a misdeed!"

I reached past my plate, and picked a morsel out of a small wicker basket. "Oh, look..." I held the trifle aloft, waiting until I'd caught Sirius's eye. "A breadstick."

Placing the tip of the breadstick in my mouth, I carefully bit off a piece with a loud 'crunch'.

He glared at me. "Evil!"

Keeping eye contact with him past my half-closed eyelids, I chewed. Noisily, and with excruciatingly languid slowness.

"Evil!" Sirius chanted, pounding the floor with his fists. "Evil, evil, evil, _evil!_ "

Turning my head, I dropped the barely-nibbled breadstick on my plate and raised my hand to shield my eyes. "Well, well, well... What do we have here?"

A procession of waiters came marching towards me, carrying trays, bowls and serving plates filled with some of the most extravagant meals that the place could offer. Sirius whined and made grabbing motions towards the dishes, but the waiters gracefully side-stepped his mewling lunges, keeping the food out of his reach.

Rubbing my chin, I nodded as each dish was placed upon the table before me.

If nothing else, this would be a good opportunity to practice what little restaurant-French I'd learned.

"Oh, my..." I gasped. "These _haricots_ are looking incredibly, uh, _douteux_. Who could resist such a fine serving of _fèves au lard_? And here we have a platter of _petite saucisses_ , and, um... _Pain blanc avec de la garniture suspicieuse oh la la_ , I believe. How exciting! And, for dessert?"

As I clapped twice, the last four waiters served the final plate of food. I waved one hand over the dish, as if I was wafting the aroma towards me, and smiled. "Mmm... _Pêches en boîte!_ Yum, yum!"

In her cell diagonally across from me, Bellatrix cackled with delight. She gleefully watched Sirius squirm and grumble, as the sausages, baked beans, sandwiches and tinned peaches were deposited on the table in front of me. "You might be a filthy Mudblood, Hebert," she giggled. "But I'll admit, you've got style."

"Evil," Sirius muttered, licking his lips. "Evil, evil, evil, evil..."

Bellatrix rubbed her hands together, eyeing the comestibles with naked greed. "Looks like your minions have been busy widdle thieves," she rasped. "Need any help getting rid of the evidence?"

Waving one arm in a magnanimous gesture, I swept my hand across the table, pointing out the dishes in my private buffet. "Certainly, Mrs. Lestrange. Anything in particular catch your fancy?"

"Oi!" Sirius cried. "I can hide evidence! I'm _great_ at disposing of evidence - especially the edible kind! I've been doing it since I was six years old!"

"Really?" Bellatrix leered at him. "I've been doing it since I was four. Then again, you always were a slow learner." She turned back to face me, and her expression returned to a haughty Pureblood upper-class facade.

"Those sandwiches look promising."

Nodding, I peeled back the topmost slice of bread on one of the sandwiches. "It would appear that the chef has provided us with a choice of egg-and-cress, or..." Checking the other triangle of white bread slices, I grimaced. "Cheese, with something that might be chutney, or might be runny pickles."

"Egg and cress?" Sirius whispered, wracked with pitiful, wet sobs. "I haven't had egg and cress since..." He paused, muttering under his breath as he counted on trembling fingers. "...Since last century!" He frowned. "Or was it last decade, in this century? Wait, what year is it, again?"

Tapping her chin, Bellatrix dithered over the sandwiches. "I'll have..." Her gaze flitted over to glance at her cousin. A broad, toothy smile slowly blossomed on her face, like sunrise on the day of an especially memorable Slaughterhouse Nine visit. "...The egg and cress." She grabbed the bars to her cell, leaning out towards me, but facing Sirius. " _Please._ "

He snarled "EVIL! Evil, evil, evil, evil, evil..."

I waved at waiters number fourteen, fifteen, and twenty-two. The crabs scurried across the table, hauling along the plate with Bellatrix's requested meal. She snatched up the dish with a triumphant giggle, and waved it past Sirius's nose as she pulled it towards her. He lunged again, jaws snapping in the air, but she just laughed as she yanked it away from him. She put it down on her end of the table, lifting the top slice to check the contents. Satisfied, she patted the sandwich and smiled.

"Not fair," Sirius growled, rattling the bars to his cell with both hands. "This is deeply unfair! She's a cold-blooded killer! A sadistic psychopath! Her biggest hobby is torturing people!" He waved at Bellatrix, who had picked up her sandwich and started playing with it; she was holding it with both hands while she sang under her breath, miming that two points of the bread triangle were feet as she made it dance around on the plate.

Sirius glared. "C'mon, 'Mima! This is rotten! Why does Bella get real food, while I just get the cheap dinner theatre, minus the dinner?!"

I stared at him. " _You know what you did._ "

Spending more than a decade in Azkaban had given Sirius the opposite of a healthy tan. Somehow, he was able to grow even paler, as he cringed away from me.

"As for your cousin..." I turned to look at her. "Mrs. Lestrange? Are you planning on torturing that poor, defenseless egg and cress?"

She grinned. "Only with my teeth." Chomping down on the sandwich with gusto, she tore out a large chunk of bread and filling with a twist of her head. "Mmm! Oh, the _pain blanc de la veille_ they serve here at Chez Azkaban is so good, you could call it _pain blanc de la Veil of Death!_ "

Ignoring Bellatrix's loud, satisfied moans and chewing noises, I looked back at Sirius. "See? It's cool."

Granted, the madwoman was more than just a little frightening. Most of her behavior, her words and her actions, tended to be either infuriating or disgusting, or both. Quite simply, the better I got to know Bellatrix Lestrange, the worse my opinion of her became. She reminded me more and more of certain people I'd hoped I could leave behind, when Mom and I moved away from Brockton Bay. It would have been so very easy, to allow myself to hate Bellatrix.

And yet... She'd been stuck in here with the Dementors for over a decade. How much of her behavior was deliberate malice, and how much was mental illness? Sirius's low opinion of her aside, had she truly been an evil monster from the start, or did Azkaban break her? For that matter, if these "wizards and witches" had other powers, different types of "Dark magic", that could affect people's minds like Dementors did... Had something happened to Bellatrix in her youth? Sirius claimed that the Black family was Dark, through and through, which might be ironic, but didn't seem all that funny, now. The way Bellatrix behaved - her mood swings, her sporadic bouts of childishness, and the glimpses of a haughty yet intelligent aristocrat that sometimes shone through... It all added up to a picture that made me wish for a psychotherapy textbook or three.

More importantly, unlike the Trio of bullies that had persecuted me at Winslow, Bellatrix could be reasoned with, after a fashion. When I treated her with politeness, respect, and just a bit of deference, she seemed willing to try curbing the worst of her excesses - or maybe she just realized the futility in trying to kill me and constantly threaten me, when we were both locked up, trapped in separate cells, and I was the only one of us who'd retained the use of my powers. Either way, that was a better deal than I'd ever gotten from Emma, Sophia, and Madison. There was probably some important point to be made, here, from the fact that a bunch of highschool girls behaved less sensibly and easy-going than a homicidal lunatic; but whether that said more about Azkaban or Winslow, I couldn't say for sure.

"Did you hear that, Siri?" Bellatrix stuck her head out past the bars. "My new Mudblood pet thinks I'm _cool_." Leering at her cousin, Bellatrix chewed her food with her mouth wide open, bits of half-eaten bread and eggs dribbling down her chin. She scraped a dollop of the soggy mess off of her lower lip and her chin, then held her goopy finger out in front of Sirius's nose. Just as he was about to bite off the offending digit, she yanked it back, laughed, and sucked it clean with a 'pop'. "Isn't that _grand?_ "

I rolled my eyes, and sighed. "More drool than cool. Also, I'm not your pet."

Jumping back a little, Sirius started waving both arms at me. "Miss, miss! Bella's being crude!" He pointed straight-armed at his cousin, chin tilted up and mouth pouting in an indignant expression. "She's masticating in public!"

Sneering, Bellatrix flapped her fingers at him, miming a yapping mouth with her hand. "Bah! In case you hadn't noticed, Sirius: We're in prison. That's about as far from being in public as you can get. The only prying eyes around here that might take offense when they see your hideous face -"

"I've got Shield Charms, you've got Sticking Charms," Sirius recited in a sing-song voice. "Anything you say will bounce off me and stick to you, ma'am."

Ignoring him, except to talk louder than his voice, Bellatrix started counting on her fingers. "...Belong to you, me, the Hebert OWL-y, the Dementors, and the occasional Auror that might deign to grace us with a visit."

Popping the last scrap of sandwich in her mouth, Bellatrix wiped the remainder of the half-chewed goop off of her face with the back of her hand. Daintily slurping up the mess, she glanced at me. "Speaking of which," she said, licking her lips.

"Don't you think the guards will object to your new dinner table?"

Looking down at the somewhat rickety piece of furniture for a moment, I shrugged at her. "Why would they? It might fill most of the hallway, but it's not that tall. The Dementors can just float past."

Bellatrix made a rude noise. "Not the ghasts and ghoulies - the goons!" She rapped her knuckles against the table. "When the Auror guards drop by, they'd have to be blind and deaf to miss noticing this thing."

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As Auror Constable Turpitus Burleigh did his rounds, carrying out the daily patrol of the most infamous prison in Magical Europe, it was unsurprising that he passed the time by musing on the cruel irony of existence. Such maudlin topics sprang to mind quite naturally, unbidden, and with great frequency, when one was surrounded by Dementors. Unlike the majority of Azkaban's population, however, his thoughts did not focus on the crimes he'd committed, due to that list being basically nonexistent.

Having been taller and more muscular than his peers since the early stages of puberty, and having been Muggleborn since birth (even though he didn't learn that term until he was eleven), Turpitus had often received comments from people - some at Hogwarts, some during his employment with the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, some of them even from total strangers, speaking up at zero provocation - pointing out that he'd probably wind up in jail, one day. Even when he'd changed his name from Todd Bailey to a more traditional Pureblood name, certain people still made those snide remarks. He wondered what those people might say, today, if they found out that their prejudice and derogatory predictions had been spot on, yet also - in regards to one very important detail - dead wrong.

After all, he might be in the clink, but he wasn't behind bars.

He felt a slap on his shoulder. "You can dwell on frowny thoughts in your spare time, Turp. Right now, you're getting paid to be happy - or at least, to think that way, to keep your Patronus fit for fightin'."

Shrugging, he glanced at his patrol partner and commanding officer, Auror Sergeant Brianna Thriftermath. "Sorry, sarge," he said. "With all these soul-suckers around, I'm not quite in a mood conducive for exuberant merriment." He scratched his chin. "I think I might be able to muster an increase from 'glum' to 'dour', if I pace myself."

She shook her head, favoring him with an indulgent smile. "Oh, constable," she sighed. "There you go again with all your fancy talk." She elbowed him in the ribs. "With that deep, rumbling, manly-man's voice you've got, your incessant complaints almost don't sound like whining."

As Turpitus walked past yet another stretch of cells, with Sgt. Thriftermath covering his back from a couple steps behind him, one of the inmates called out. "Ye've got a real sweet mouth on yer, missy," he croaked, leering at the Auror Sergeant. "How's about a wee kiss fer a poor feller, what's been down on 'is luck fer a while?"

Sgt. Thriftermath glanced up at Turpitus, indicating the wolf-whistling prisoner with a sideways nod of her head. "Who's this sorry-lookin' bloke, constable?"

Flicking through a few sheets of parchment on his clipboard, Turpitus cleared his throat. "Weldon Plumsbody, sarge. Doing three years for petty theft, got two-and-a-half years left to go."

"That's me," the grime-encrusted humanoid figure said with a toothy smirk. "An' lemme tell ye, if'n ye pucker up an' lock lips wit Weldon Plumsbody, ye won't soon regret it! Whene'er I snog a wummen in me special way, they's always says-"

Thriftermath held up a finger. "Ah, let me guess... The woman says: 'Weldon, that wasn't well done at all', yeah?"

Turning back to Turpitus, she scratched her neck at the base of her short, blonde ponytail. "Really? A whole three years in the 'Ban, for petty theft? Judges must've been feelin' narky that day, after experiencing his charming personality, eh?"

Squinting a little, Turpitus held the clipboard closer to his face. "Ah... Sorry, sarge. The parchment's gotten slightly crumpled. It's actually petticoat theft."

Planting her fists on her hips, Thriftermath looked up at the ceiling. "Mmm... Still not seeing it. Pinching a couple of frilly underthings-"

"Er..." Turpitus tapped the clipboard. "Well, since Mr. Plumsbody is one-sixteenth ooze mephit, they decided to try him as a Dark creature."

Thriftermath gave a long, low whistle. "Merlin's curly hairs, constable, if that ain't some kind of impressive. Odd that they didn't just let the Dementors snog him, then, unless he got himself a fancy lawyer who could point out that ooze mephits ain't really Dark, just mucky."

With a wet, rheumy cackle, Plumsbody shook his head. "Nah, I'm a reg'lar panty-dropper, me. Them there spooks won't get a chance ter suck face wit me, wit all the witches linin' up to get a bit a Weldon." He pursed his lips. "But, tell ye what... I'll let ye skip ahead ter the front a the queue, since I always 'ad a fing fer witches in uniform."

Turpitus frowned at the gaunt-faced inmate, who'd started making loud kissy noises. "That's highly inappropriate, sir. You should-"

Waving him off, Thriftermath laughed.

"Dementors have only been out of this hall for five minutes, and he's already feelin' chipper enough to start sexually harassing witches again? That takes gumption, constable, pure get-up-and-go. That almost calls for a little reward, wouldn't you say?"

Several inmates in nearby cells were starting to stir, as well.

"Yeah, we've all earned a prize!"

"I'm game for a quick snuggle, girly, if'n you ask me nicely!"

"Oi! I saw her first!"

"Aw, you're such a dirty liar, Blind Hugh!"

"Shut up! We'll all get a turn!"

Stepping closer to the cell, Thriftermath leaned against the bars. "Brace yourself, Weldon," she murmured. "I'm about to blow your socks off."

One of the neighbors stuck his head out past the bars to his own cell, grinning at them. "Say, if you're in the mood for blowin' things, miss, then co-"

"Bugger off, Butterwick!" Plumsbody cried. "Ye can wait yer damn turn!"

Butterwick looked sad, holding up a small, crumbling lump of something that might once have been made in a bakery, or at least swept up off the floor of one. "But I've been saving this here birthday cake for three years! I can't blow out the candles on my own, what with my lungs the way they are, and all."

Plumsbody ignored him, and leaned forward, lips puckered with anticipation.

Thriftermath smiled.

Eyelashes all a-flutter, Plumsbody closed his eyes.

Swiveling on one foot, Thriftermath swung her other leg forward in a swift movement, aiming between the bars.

There was a loud - and somewhat moist - cracking noise, followed by an agonized yelp.

Something small and yellow ricocheted off of the cell's wall with a 'plink', skittering across the floor.

Straightening, the Auror Sergeant gave a small nod of satisfaction. She turned, panning her gaze across the neighboring cells. Staring each shocked-looking face in the eyes, one by one, she smiled at the paling inmates. "Who's next?"

The prisoners launched into an impromptu performance of synchronized head-shaking, accompanied by a chorus of high-pitched "Nuh-uh!"s and "Not me!"s.

"...Uh, we haven't earned that privy-ledge, uh, ma'am."

"My boots get awful jealous, if I go kissin' other footwear."

"Stanley had his hand up, just now! He volunteered! I saw him!"

"I'll get you for this, Blind Hugh!"

"Shut up, all of you!"

Finally, Thriftermath made eye contact with Butterwick. He stared at her for several long seconds. Then, he blinked a few times, covered his mouth with one hand while making a very fake yawn. Almost nonchalantly, he tossed the cake stump aside. "Probably isn't even my birthday, today."

"Blurgh!" Plumsbody burbled, cradling his jaw with one hand. Spitting out a gobbet of bloody phlegm and saliva, he tried again. "Bah! Ye're all a gaggle a' nesh jessies, ye are! Can't e'en appreciate a fine figger of a wimmin."

Butterwick stared at him. "She just kicked out one of your teeth!"

Plumsbody grinned, slightly more gap-toothed than he'd been five minutes ago. "Shows the wee lass's got spirit!" He shrugged, poking a dirty finger in his mouth. "B'sides, it'll grow back."

Turpitus heard one of the other inmates mutter something about 'bloody half-breeds'; might have been one of the imprisoned Death Eaters or their sympathizers. He glanced at his colleague. "Are we done with this floor, sarge?"

Thriftermath shot him a piercing look; she probably read more from his tone than his straightforward question had conveyed. She nodded, then flicked out her wand and brought it around in a sweeping gesture. "You know the drill, constable. Send your Patronus ahead, so they can clear the stairs for us."

Following Sgt. Thriftermath's example, Turpitus performed a quick bit of wand-work. Seconds later, everyone in the hallway seemed to perk up, as the atmosphere grew less dismal.

Then, the gloomy prison corridor grew lighter in a quite literal sense, as the warm, clean glow of two Patronus animals swept down the hallway towards them, returning from where they'd kept this floor's Dementors at bay. The first arrival was a tremendous beast, taking up almost the entire space between the rows of cells, and sometimes even dipping a quasi-corporeal fin through a wall or the ceiling. Turpitus idly imagined the looks on the inmates' faces, sitting in their cells on the floor above, when they felt a sudden surge of happiness and safety out of nowhere, followed by witnessing a huge, glowing shark's fin swimming through the floor, like an oncoming Patagonian Bulette Land-Shark.

As the immense hammerhead shark swam ponderously through the air towards them, easily spanning over four meters from hammer-shaped nose to tail - or thirteen feet, as the Purebloods might measure it - a tiny swift figure came zooming around it, equally luminescent. The bullfinch flew a few loops around the Aurors, then perched along the side of one of the bars to Butterwick's cell. On a regular bullfinch, the patch of dark feathers on top of its head would have made it look like it was wearing a black cap; on a Patronus, the cap just appeared a little less radiant than the rest of its body.

Plumsbody, Butterwick, and the rest of the inmates looked between the two Aurors and their guardian spirits made manifest. It was no doubt a memorable sight; Turpitus knew that he and Sgt. Thriftermath were cartoonishly ill-matched, with one of them a tall, broad-shouldered figure, built like a brick outhouse, while the other was skinny, blonde, and short enough that she could hide behind a well-trimmed hedgerow without needing to crouch.

Having their Patronus animals present did nothing to make the pair look less lopsided.

"Cor," one of the inmates said, in an almost reverent tone. "That's a mighty impressive-looking pair of Patronususses, that is! Ain't never seen anything so beautiful!"

Sgt. Thriftermath nodded at the awestruck convict. "Ta, Mr. Hugh. If your nickname's got any basis in truth, you probably still haven't."

Plumsbody whistled, as best he could manage. "Ye must be roit pop'lar wiv the witches, lad, if'n ye can whip out sumfink like that from yer wand!"

Turpitus stood in silence, as his bullfinch Patronus fluttered down to land on top of his head. "...No comment."

Snickering at her junior partner's discomfort, Sgt. Thriftermath let her huge shark Patronus nuzzle against her shoulder. Reaching up, she scratched the semi-corporeal sea creature under its wide cephalofoil - or, as most people would call it: 'The hammer-shaped bit in front'.

"You lot do realize that, once we move on to check the next floor, the Dementors will swoop back in to swarm all over this level of the building, right?"

Slumping, the prisoners all went from laughter to dismayed groans in scant seconds.

Turpitus and Sgt. Thriftermath sauntered off to take the stairs going up, with their Patronus animals leading the way. They walked in silence for a minute. As they reached the stairway, the sergeant glanced sidelong at Turpitus. "Never forget, constable, that those scumbags deserve far worse than just a boot in the teeth. Hopefully, they're already getting a worse treatment, if the Dementors are doing their job right." Her voice lowered as she muttered something under her breath. Still, Turpitus didn't need to hear her words to guess what she was saying; something along the lines of "damn the Wizengamot", "going soft in their old age", "forcing us to patrol the 'Ban nearly every day", "coddling hardened criminals", "better in the old days", "don't do the crime if you can't take the sanity-blasting punishment", and so on, and so forth.

Watching his shining white bullfinch Patronus light up the dim corners of the cells as they passed, Turpitus frowned. "Haven't said otherwise, sarge."

She jabbed a thumb over her shoulder. "If you ain't secretly disapproving of my heavy-handed and heavier-booted disciplinary measures, why were you looking at me funny, back there?" Her eyes narrowed. "...You're not secretly harboring a crush on your superior officer, are you? Anything you want to tell me about how you and I mysteriously keep ending up on Azkaban duty together, constable?"

Watching Sgt. Thriftermath waving her wand over the steel-reinforced tip of her boot, vanishing the reddish stains, Turpitus swallowed on reflex, despite his mouth suddenly feeling dry. "P-probably just the other Aurors having a laugh, sarge. You know we've only got a handful of officers who can reliably cast and maintain a corporeal Patronus long enough to last a full patrol, and, well..." He shrugged. "I guess they think it's amusing to see our initials on the shift schedule parchment, sort of... Adjacent, y'know?"

He relaxed when the sergeant just laughed and waved him ahead. Then, she froze. "That's new," she murmured. "And in a place like this, 'new' usually means summat along the lines of 'unanticipated mortal peril'."

Assuming a combat stance, wand at the ready, Turpitus scanned the surroundings. "What is it, sarge?"

Doing her own visual sweep, Sgt. Thriftermath took the time to shoot him a quick look.

"You ever had the inclination to read them there Muggle stories about a warlock detective, constable?"

Turpitus gave her a confused nod. "That's not his... I mean, yes? Of course I have, sarge. Why do you ask?"

"Well, seeing as how that's the case," she said. "I should like to draw your attention to the curious incident of the Patronus animals in the night-time."

Following her pointing finger, Turpitus soon realized what her cryptic comments had meant. Up ahead, the luminous forms of Sgt. Thriftermath's hammerhead shark and his own bullfinch Patronus had ceased roaming the corridor ahead of them. Instead, they were halted in front of a large, heavy oaken door, strengthened with thick bands of cold-forged iron. The two glowing animals were staring intently at the doorway, as if they were gazing past the solid wood, watching whatever might be happening beyond.

Every so often, the guardian spirits would turn their heads in unison, staring up at the same spot on the ceiling, or into a wall. What could possibly have caught their attention like that?

A second look around was enough to confirm part of Turpitus's suspicions: They'd reached the last door of Azkaban, beyond which lay its greatest horrors - the maximum security cells.

(Sgt. Thriftermath would probably have described it in less poetic terms, preferring something more prosaic, like: 'The stinkiest part of the cesspit'. In fact, she had, on multiple occasions.)

"You're right, sarge," he said. "They shouldn't have stopped like that, without a direct order from us."

The sergeant's face went from focused professionalism to grim amusement in three seconds flat. "...Unless there's more Dementors past that door than they can handle."

Bursting into movement, she strode up to the entrance.

"Sarge!" Turpitus hissed. "What are you doing?!"

"Just need to check something, now shush," she said, pressing one ear to the door. After a tense few seconds, her smile widened - or at least, bared more teeth. She stayed by the door for a little longer, paying rapt attention to whatever she was hearing. With another sudden decision, she began walking back the way they'd come. "Don't dawdle, constable. Last one back to the DMLE fetches the tea and biscuits."

Watching her go, mouth agape, it took Turpitus a moment to regain the power of coherent speech. "...S-sarge? Shouldn't we check the max wing, before we leave?"

Stopping a dozen paces down the hallway, Sgt. Thriftermath spun back to face him, smiling as she cupped a hand behind her ear. "Can't you hear it, constable? Like music, it is."

With some hesitation, Turpitus slowly sidled up to the door, and tried to listen. Once his ear was this close to the doorway, he didn't need a Super-Sensory Charm to pick up the sound of anguished screams.

"Evil! Evil! Evil, evil, evil! This is despicable! Inhumane! How could you do this, you heartless monster! Evil! Evil! Eeevillll!"

Turpitus turned back to his sergeant. "Is that... Sirius Black?!"

If there'd ever been any doubt as to whether or not the petite Sgt. Thriftermath had a temperament suited for a shark Patronus, the smile on her face right then would have dispelled any and all such uncertainties. "I have no idea what those Dementors are doing to him, in there, but I haven't heard him squeal like that in years," she growled. "And I reckon he's earned every second of it, for what he did to the Potters."

Turpitus joined Sgt. Thriftermath, walking away down the hallway. Their Patronus animals followed in their wake, more than once glancing back at that last door.

"Come on, Turp," the sergeant called over her shoulder in an almost cheerful tone. "I'm positively famished, and it's not like we'll get a four-course meal in this place, are we?"

 **xdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbx**

I blinked at Bellatrix. "The Aurors?" I smiled. "...Somehow, I doubt we have to worry about them dropping by, anytime soon."

She just scoffed at me, murmuring something about "widdle naive Mudbloods".

I shrugged, and finished my own sandwich. Thankfully, the cheese-and-chutney-or-pickle garnish was pretty much edible - or maybe I was just hungry enough that my stomach had threatened my taste buds into keeping quiet.

"...I'm sorry."

Looking up from the plate of baked beans I was considering, I saw Sirius standing in his cell with his back to me, shoulders hunched and hands crammed down the pockets of his raggedy trousers. He glanced over his shoulder at me, then quickly looked away again.

I cupped one hand around my ear. "Pardon? Did someone say something?"

Sirius heaved a deep sigh, breath rattling from his lungs with a wheeze of teenager-esque exasperation and chronic bronchial dysfunction. "I sa-a-aid," he drawled, kicking a pebble aside. "I'm sorry."

Folding my arms, I watched him in silence.

He rolled his eyes, having half-turned so his side was towards me. "I'm sorry for writing notes in your book. I shouldn't have done it, certainly not without asking permission, and... Well... Sorry." He shrugged, hanging his head, letting long strands of matted black hair hide his face.

I snorted. "You did more than just write in it, though, didn't you? There were..." My voice lowered to a hiss. " _Illustrations._ "

Sirius held up his hands like a shield, waving them in a placating gesture, eyes wide. "It was an improvement! That pile of soppy sh- ...Shopping lists, and people drinking coffee with acquaintances they didn't like, so they could gossip about acquaintances they disliked even more, behind their backs... It was boring! There was just a lot of chaste pecks on the cheek, and mushy poetic rot!" He waved his arms in the air. "It needed some proper action scenes!"

Picking up the evidence in question, I flipped a few pages, holding it open with one hand and pointing out some of Sirius's doodles, showing it to him. "And you thought the best way to add some 'action', was with a series of drawings depicting a stick figure called 'Wormtail', as he suffers a variety of gruesome and no doubt painful ways to die?"

He raised a finger, opening his mouth. After a few seconds of silence, he closed his mouth and lowered his hand again.

Thumbing through the dog-eared paperback, I found exhibit C, and presented it to Sirius. It was tempting to let my hench-crabs carry it over to his cell and rub his nose in his mistake, in a very literal sense, but I wasn't sure what state the book might be in, when I got it back. "Oh, look," I said. "Here's one where Wormtail has been decapitated, and his head shoved up his own-"

"Hey, now! That one's very, uh, sophisticated! Yeah, because, y'see, 'Perm-tail' rhymes with Wormtail, and a perm is a hairdo, so when his scalp is the only thing poking out of his..." He faltered under my glare, shivering a little. "...Uh, I mean... I'm sorry I forgot to ask what your mortal enemy looks like, so I could draw some of them, too?"

Carefully closing the book and placing it on the table, I stared at him until he stopped studying his own feet, and looked me in the eyes. "You do realize that this is the only book I've been able to find in this place, right? Besides, it might've looked like just another trashy paperback romance novel, and, admittedly, it is a paperback romance, but..." Tapping a finger on the book, I watched him over the rim of my glasses. "It's actually wicked good, y'know? If..." I cleared my throat. " _When_ I get out of this place, I might look up the author, Violet Tsirblou, see if she's written anything else." I sighed. "Just because you don't enjoy this type of story, doesn't give you the right to try and turn it into... Um..."

What Hollywood blockbuster action movies had a revenge theme? Most of them? All of them? More importantly, which ones would Sirius recognize, if I referenced them?

Come to think of it, did wizards even go to the movies? Most of the non-incarcerated wand-wavers I'd encountered had been dressed in very old-fashioned and quirky outfits, probably as a result of their magic-themed mass cosplay - either, their seclusion kept them ignorant of the existence of fashion developments any newer than the start of the 20th century, or they deliberately stuck to ancient clothing styles, because they felt it was a better fit for cultivating a 'wizardly' look. Would they be any more interested in modern entertainment? If Sirius was truly so oblivious about parahumans and Endbringers, odds were that he wouldn't have ventured out in the wider world beyond 'Wizarding Britain' long enough to go to the cinema for quite some time.

Heck, he'd been in prison for over a decade. That'd put a crimp in anyone's social life, even if he could find a movie theater that would be willing to sell tickets to people who turned into large dogs, when-

...Huh.

Dogs, and quests for vengeance? That reminded me of the glimpses I'd caught of Sirius in his Changer form.

I grinned. "Like I said, that doesn't give you the right to try and turn my one and only piece of reading material into an especially bloodthirsty rewrite of _Shep of the Painted Hills_."

Sirius scratched his head, frowning at me. "...Who of the what now?"

My smile faded. Ah. Swing and a miss, then? That one had even been published around the time of World War I, hadn't it?

"It's... Well, it's a book about a dog," I said. "The dog's best friend is betrayed and murdered, and the traitor almost manages to kill the dog, as well."

Wide-eyed, Sirius gripped the bars to his cell, staring at me without blinking. "...Then what happens? Does... Does the dog get revenge?"

"Well... Sort of?" I grimaced. "I mean, the dog kinda leads the traitor into a... A trap, in a manner of speaking, and the traitor dies at the end, and then the dog and its remaining family lives happily ever after, so... Basically, yes?" Finding a literal gold mine was probably a solid foundation for a long-term happy ending, right?

Once in a while, Mom had shown me class photos of some of her students, joking about how their cheerful expressions were due to either ignorance of how much work lay ahead of them, or relief at thinking they could finally catch a break, depending on whether the photos had been taken at the beginning or the end of the school year. Privately, I'd sometimes wondered if any of those happy people had been feeling elated because of some wonderful novel or other piece of edifying literature, that had been introduced to them by Mom.

Right then and there, in that chilly cell block of sunless Azkaban, the smile on Sirius's face was more radiant than any hundred of those class photos put together.

Still, as much as it saddened me to ruin his good mood again, I needed to be consistent with my discipline. Otherwise, he would never... Oh for crying out loud, I really was turning into my Mom, wasn't I? Not that I had anything against being like my mother - she's wicked awesome, both in terms of personality and looks - but I hadn't planned on _being_ a mother, anytime soon. I hadn't even graduated high school, yet! Damn man-babies... Can't live with 'em, can't get away from them when you're locked in a prison cell next to them.

"Very well, Mr. Black," I said, folding my arms over my chest. "If you, uh, truly understand and regret the error of your ways, I suppose I might rescind your punishment."

Slapping his hands on his chest, Sirius pushed up to the bars, as close as he could get to me. "Oi! I already apologized! I'm honestly regretful! Verily, I am overflowing with contrition!"

"Overflowing with something, alright," I muttered.

He grabbed his long hair with both of his bony hands, yanking it aside to bare his sallow face.

"Behold! This is my shame-faced face!"

Bellatrix sneered, pulling the knife out of her mouth that she'd been using as a toothpick. "Your face is always shameful, Blood Traitor. Would you like me to take care of it for you?" She grinned, hefting the knife and a fork like a pair of scissors. "Snip, snip?"

"Alright, that's enough," I called out, before Sirius and Bellatrix could get into another screaming match. "I accept your apology." Flicking my fingers at him, a group of crabs scampered across the table and put the place of cocktail sausages in front of him.

Barking out a joyous noise that might have been "Thank you!", he proceeded to inhale the food.

After he'd spent half a minute or so, ravenously gorging himself, he made a grunting noise that sounded less like "Get in my mouth, already," and more like "Hang on, I just remembered something". There was, I suppose, a small yet non-zero chance that the thing he'd suddenly recalled was the existence of a funny concept called 'table manners', but I wouldn't bet money on it.

He held up a finger. He rummaged around in his pockets and soon pulled out a wad of... Scraps of white paper? He held them up with a flourish, waving them at me and grunting excitedly past a mouthful of half-chewed cocktail sausages.

Hang on, were those...?

My eyes widening, I snatched up my paperback. Flipping to the very end, I scrutinized the middle of the page spread, right at the spine. It was exactly as bad as I'd feared.

Sirius let out a yowl of fear and confusion, when I thrust an imperious pointed finger directly at him - or maybe he was whining about the mob of crabs that descended upon him like the wrath of an angry Goddess of Crustaceans. The two things happened simultaneously, so, y'know, either-or.

I held up the paperback, carefully keeping the back cover splayed open without creasing the spine any worse than it had already been mistreated, and jabbed a finger at the latest discovered defacement.

I snarled at the miscreant. "Did you do this?"

Looking completely wrong-footed, Sirius slurped up a sausage scrap he'd had dangling between his lips, and swallowed. "Um... N-no? That wasn't me, that was some bird called Violet. Remember? You said so, yourself!"

I held the paperback closer to him, arm stretched out between the bars. "I'm not talking about who wrote it, I'm talking about who tore out the last pages." My unoccupied hand clenched into a fist. " _I hadn't finished reading it, yet_. Now, I'll-"

"Oh!" Sirius yipped out a nervous laugh. "Don't worry, I, uh, only ripped out the blank pages? You know, the spare ones they put at the very back?"

We were both silent as I examined the book more closely. At the corner of the table, Bella sucked noisily on half a peach, watching the show. She'd taken the opportunity to steal the fruit while I'd appeared distracted with Sirius's latest antics.

I made a mental note to try and scold Bellatrix, later, for her lapse in manners - she'd agreed to try setting a good example for Sirius, after all - and maybe ask her where she'd learned to wield a peach-laden fork with her toes like that.

"Right," I said, putting down the book, once I'd carefully double-checked that the final pages of the story did, indeed, seem to be intact, while picking up as few spoilers as possible. "Okay, then. Well, I approve of your interest in improving your personal hygiene, but if you wanted napkins, you could have just asked. I might be able to find some in-"

Sirius rolled his eyes. "I didn't use them to wipe my..." His gaze flicked over to the bucket in the corner of his cell. "Fingers."

...Thankfully, my crabs had been able to acquire a few spare sheets of tattered cloth, and some frayed rope. Bathroom breaks had become marginally less stressful, once all three of us were able to have a modicum of privacy - a rare commodity, when you were locked in a cell with a direct line of sight to your neighbors. Rigging up a few crude curtains to screen off a corner of each cell only took an hour, or so: About five minutes per curtain, plus forty-five minutes spent listening to Sirius, as he complained about his new pre-owned drapes smelling like Dementor armpits. Honestly, where did he think I was going to get spare cloth in a place like this?

Bellatrix, on the other hand, seemed entirely too enthusiastic about the idea of using the aroma of these old sheets, redolent with vintage monster-sweat, as a sort of Dark Arts bathroom air-freshener. Mom always taught me not to yuck someone else's yum, but there had to be limits.

Anyway. When Sirius held up the pages again, waving them at me, I sent hench-crab twenty-eight over to him with a gesture.

He handed over the torn-out pages, and the crab scurried back to my side of the table. Sirius chuckled, scratching his beard. "Look at him go! He's like a tiny knight in armor, charging around with, uh, those paper scraps dangling from his claw like little white pennants. Y'know, tha-"

I let the crab drape the papers across my palm. "You're not planning on making a joke about 'pennants' and 'penance', are you?" I counted with the fingers of my empty hand. "You already doodled in my book, and tore out pages, both times without asking permission... The three-strikes rule is a thing, y'know?"

Clasping his hands and putting on his best puppy-dog eyes, Sirius whined. "Ple-e-ease? How often am I gonna get an opportunity like this?"

I sighed. "Go on, then. If it means so much to you, knock yourself out." Tuning out the sound of his voice as he proceeded to pun to his heart's content, I examined the papers. Each page had been torn into smaller strips, with large block-letter writing on one side:

Geraldine, Mildred, Bartholomew, Desmond, Gladys, Suzanne, Tim, Alice, Admiral Plimsoll...

I looked up at Sirius. "...You made name tags for the Dementors?"

He rubbed his chin through his beard. "Yes, well... You went to all the trouble of naming them, so it seemed like it'd be a bit of a waste, if I didn't make sure those names got used." He shrugged, and smiled. "You might be able to tell those floating rags apart at a glance, but I need a bit more to go on. Frankly, all Dementors look the same, to me."

Bellatrix stuck her head out between the bars to her cell. "And you call _me_ bigoted?"

Still, even with the by-play from the peanut gallery, that small gesture seemed... Oddly touching.

"...Thanks, Sirius."

And then, everyone remembered that they had something close to proper food on the table, for the first time in years, and the tender moment was thrown to the wayside. Thankfully, that meant I could dab a few errant tears from my eyes with the corner of Tim's name tag, without anyone noticing, or at least without comment.

Using one hand to pretend I was orchestrating a crab ballet, I let my crustacean gophers ferry plates back and forth across the table. Wielding the biggest spoon I'd been able to salvage from the castle's murky bowels, I ladled up beans and peaches, dividing them in three roughly even portions. I wasn't sure whether baked beans counted towards the recommended daily intake of fruits and vegetables, and if so, whether they were counted individually, or per spoonful; at least I could share the wealth equally.

"You know, that's something that's been bothering me..." Waiting for the others to look up from their food, I gestured at the remains of our meal. "We're usually fed gruel, and the Aurors only seem to visit a couple of times per week, never staying longer than it takes to inspect the castle, so..." I held up a spoonful of beans. "Why have a larder stocked with canned food and stuff? Not that I'm complaining, except maybe about having to learn how to get crabs to operate a can opener, but... It just doesn't make much sense, y'know?"

Sirius sniggered, wiping peach juice off of his beard. "I love hearing you say 'larder'," he giggled. "So, you reckon having a lah-duh is too la-di-dah for a place like Azkaban?" He shrugged. "Well, you're not wrong."

I swallowed a mouthful, waving my empty spoon at him. "Hey, I don't make fun of your accent."

"That's because I don't have one," the butt-head rebutted. "Unlike you, I'm normal."

Before either Bellatrix or I could object to that blatant falsehood, he continued talking. "Anyway, I can think of two obvious reasons for that larder, off the top of my head." He rubbed his chin. "Did your crabs find any chocolate in there?"

"Plenty," I nodded. "I'm saving it for a special occasion."

He rolled his eyes at me. "Sitting in a cell, surrounded by hundreds of specimens of one of the most dangerous types of Dark creatures in the world," he rambled. "You find a stash of anti-Dementor sweets, and what do you do? Tuck it away for a rainy day." He sighed, shaking his head. "What is the world coming to? Honestly, the youth of today..."

I arched an eyebrow at him. "Oh, I can be youthful, and reckless. Watch." I twirled a finger, while two of my smallest crabs climbed on top of my shoulders. Taking care not to hurt myself, I had them pinch my earlobes. "I've been thinking about getting my ears pierced."

Then, I had to send out more crabs and have them swat Sirius on the back as best they could, when he began laughing so hard, he nearly choked on his food. However many karma points I might have earned for my selfless act of heroism, trying to save him from cocktail sausage-induced asphyxiation, they were most likely outweighed by my having made him laugh with his mouth full, in the first place. Well, that, and the fact that I couldn't resist turning my head from side to side, making the dangling crabs dance and sway like huge novelty earrings, which only made Sirius choke even more.

"One of the purposes of the larder is probably as incentives for bribes," Bellatrix said. She was watching Sirius's life-or-death struggle against his own dinner, excitement clear on her grimy face. "Rich cowards like Malfoy," she said, spitting the name like a curse. "Often buy their way out of going to Azkaban, when they lack the conviction to stand by their ideals. Penniless scum are left to rot." She glanced up at me, eyes glittering under her dark lashes. "And then there's the ones in-between. Not enough Galleons to get out, just a teensy spot of Sickles to buy a widdle reprieve from the Dementors, a nice treat to tide them over one more day."

I nodded. "So, chocolate is some sort of antidote to the Dementors' aura? And the rest of the food is an improvement on the regular gruel. The Auror guards take a bribe from one of the inmates, and the prisoner gets a bit of food, or chocolate."

"That's..." Sirius gasped and wheezed, having seemingly won his battle with the cocktail sausage. "That's probably just the unofficial reason. They can't..." He coughed. "They can't really write 'chocolate supplies for illicit purposes' in the Ministry's official expense accounts, can they? Most likely, the pantry's been added as an emergency supply, in case one of the visiting Aurors mingled for too long with the round-the-clock Dementor guard crew. Then, they just kept adding to it, off the record."

I hummed a little, savoring the flavors of the bite of peach in my mouth; slightly too syrupy, and way too sugary sweet, but still miles better than the regular slop we were served. "Where did the Dementors come from?" I asked after I'd finished chewing and swallowing. "There doesn't seem to be a lot of furniture or, well, anything in here; has this place always been used as a jail, with flying prison wardens that don't need break rooms?" I ran my hand over the table, such as it was; in reality, I'd had to settle for scavenging driftwood from the island's rocky beaches, outside. The range of my control seemed to cover most of the castle, and a chunk of the island around it.

The major hindrance to my exploration of the fortress was still the presence of those vermin-repelling whatchamacallits that Sirius had mentioned - wards, or charms, or whatever it was they called these particular Master powers... Or anti-Master, in this case. My small collection of bugs refused to enter several rooms and corridors, and in some cases entire floors of the prison. Maybe I could find a way to bypass the barriers, with some time and effort, or maybe I'd need to find some tougher, more headstrong bugs. At the moment, my meager swarm consisted mostly of fleas, lice, and various intestinal parasites, which... Probably weren't the best topics to be mulling over while I was eating dinner.

Thankfully, my crabs seemed to be exempt from many of the Vermin-Vamoosin' Wards (based on what I'd learned about wizards, that might even be the official name). Maybe the crustaceans in the area never tried to get into the castle, before, so nobody had bothered to make sure that they were included in the exclusion?

Once I'd found out that I could explore a decent portion of Azkaban with my hench-crabs, I made another discovery: It turned out that the place even had its own cemetery, judging by the rows of evenly spaced wooden markers - some of them cobbled together from two crossed planks, some just simple slabs of wood - that had been stuck in the ground in an area beside the castle. Some of the wood for my new patchwork dining table had come from a supply stack of spare planks, on the outskirts of the burial plot. I hadn't stooped so low as to steal any of the wooden markers that were already in use. Partly out of respect for the dead, but also because I doubted my crabs could get enough leverage to dig out one of the planks.

Sirius scratched his ear, looking at the ceiling. "Oh, well... Azkaban has only been a prison since... The eighteenth century, I think. The Dementor colony on the island has been here for a couple hundred years before that, though."

At this point, I almost suffered the same fate as Sirius, choking on a mouthful of baked beans. "...Say what?! It can't be that old, there wasn't any... I mean..."

Sirius nodded, tilting his chin up and stroking his beard like a sage. "Part of the bludger designs used in modern Quidditch were invented around the same time, which means that, truly..." He waggled his eyebrows. "This place is old as balls."

He looked disappointed when I didn't laugh, or even roll my eyes, at his antics. Bellatrix looked disappointed that her cousin wasn't choking to death anymore. Personally, I was a bit disappointed in myself; I'd forgotten how thoroughly these people upheld their 'wizards and witches' pretense, I'd overlooked some of the obvious implications.

If their fantasy-themed cosplay really was a twenty-four-seven habit, a set of roles they stuck to so completely, they never broke character, it might be more than just a game or a theme, to them. Their organization might be heavily regulated, using endless propaganda or even some sort of Master-type brainwashing to keep every member compliant. They might suffer from a shared delusion - there were official psychological terms for such things, probably, even if I couldn't think of any at the moment. Plenty of explanations presented themselves, once I mulled it over for a minute, which all boiled down to this: Even though it was impossible for these Dementors to have been around for hundreds of years, since parahumans hadn't been a thing prior to the eighties, it was entirely possible that these people believed it to be true. This meant that, anything I learned from my fellow inmates, I'd need to take with a heaping great big pinch of salt.

Good thing I had the North Sea within crab-walking distance, then.

There was another possibility, of course; parahumans might turn out to be hundreds of years old, but had just been in hiding all that time, like these people seemed to suggest. I shelved that thought, for now, since I didn't have nearly enough evidence that supported the theory, for me to start climbing down that crazy rabbit hole.

Either way, whether Dementors turned out to be projections, or clones, or some weird Tinker-tech hover-drones powered by other people's happy thoughts, I'd have to play along with these convicts and their delusions, if I wanted to coax more information out of them.

Besides, I'd already established myself as an East Coast Enchantress, a mighty Conjurer of Crabs. It'd look odd if I started to break character, all of a sudden.

"Okay, sure," I said. "So, uh... Who hath wielded ye olden spells and sorceries, that brought forth this fell and dismal Azkaban? The great wizard Merlin, himself, perchance?"

...Nice work, Taylor. Real smooth, mucho stylish. A+ espionage techniques.

Carefully keeping my embarrassment off my face and as far out of my mind as I could shove it, I watched Sirius laugh, and then draw himself up in a mock-stern pose, extravagant finger-wagging included. "Nay, of course not! 'Twas the nefarious work of..." His arm drooped down as he paused. He scratched his scalp, squinting in concentration. "I think the bloke's name was... Crisscross, or something like that. It's been a while since I slept my way through History of Magic classes."

"Blithering imbecile!" Bellatrix stuck an arm out between the bars, and hurled a fork at him. Sirius caught it, and inspected it for a second. Then, he huffed on the fork, rubbed it on his sleeve in a likely futile attempt at cleaning the tarnished metal - or at least distribute the dirt a little more evenly - and began combing himself with it.

Clenching her hands like she wanted to strangle him, or at least get her fork back by any means necessary, Bellatrix hissed and snarled. "His name was Ekrizdis, you feckless oik!"

Sirius pretended to groom his nose hairs with the fork. "Nuh-uh, cousin. It's true that my middle name is spelled O-I-K, but it's pronounced..." He pressed one hand to his puffed-up chest, sticking his elbow out at an attention-grabbing angle, and spoke in a breathy voice, fluttering his eyelashes. "...Orion!"

Bellatrix planted her fists on her hips and shook her head, wild mane of curls lashing about. "Nuh-uh, yourself! There's an 'M', and no 'I', in 'Moron'!"

Ignoring her comment, Sirius held one hand next to his mouth as he turned to look at me. "Our family has always been huge proponents of saddling kids with names from arse-'stronomy," he stage-whispered in a loud and hoarse voice. "On account of the entire House of Black having their collective heads up their own bum."

I nodded, giving him a sympathetic look. "Sure, that makes sense. I'd noticed certain symptoms of cranio-rectal inversion syndrome."

Sirius looked confused, but Bellatrix just cackled. "You might be obsessed with jamming heads up into backsides, Silly-woose, but at least you're looking at the stars, while you're up there!" She spun her knife between her fingers, displaying impressive dexterity for someone so emaciated and shaky-looking. "Or you will be, once I've disemboweled you," she murmured.

"Hang on..." Sirius narrowed his eyes, pointing an accusing finger at Bellatrix. "That was some sort of Muggle phrase you just butchered, to make a threat about butchering people!"

Bellatrix looked shocked, for just a brief instant, before returning to one of her three default expressions: Barely-contained violent anger. "Impossible! I heard the Dark Lord himself say those words, once!"

"You've just Muggled, Bella! You Muggled all over yourself!" Sirius said, shaking with laughter. His voice changed to a sing-song tone, as he began to sway rhythmically from side to side. "Bella and her Dark Lump, sitting in a tree! Emm, you, gee, gee, L-I-N gee!"

Visibly bristling - in a quite literal sense; evidently, one of Bellatrix's grab-bag powers was an ability to make her wild mane of dark hair seem to grow even more expansive and tangled, like a billowing storm cloud - Bellatrix opened her mouth, ready to launch into another homicidal tirade.

Her expression changed, sliding into another of her three default expressions: Childishly sadistic amusement. She tilted her head to peer at me. Oh, there was that smile again, the one that showed all her teeth.

"Oh, hello, widdle OWL-y," she cooed. "Would you like to hear a story? Hmm?"

Giggling a little, Sirius applauded. "Splendid idea, Bella! One of your bedtime stories should be just the thing to keep us awake all night, staring at the ceiling."

Clasping her hands together, Bellatrix rocked back and forth with excitement. "So! Have you ever he-e-eard..." She drew out the word, then paused. Glancing left and right, like she was searching for eavesdroppers in this depopulated corridor that never had any visitors, she leaned closer. "...About what Silly-Woose did at my sister Narcissa's fifteenth birthday party?"

When Sirius heard her half-whispered question, his face turned so deeply and profoundly horrified, I immediately redoubled my covert efforts at having the hench-crabs try to find a working camera.

"Silly and Jimmy and Remmy and Petey were such naughty boys!" Bellatrix squealed, clapping her hands over her cheeks. "Ever so naughty! You see, what Silly-Woose did, was-"

"You swore!" Sirius bellowed, spittle flying from his cracked lips as he gripped the bars to his cell hard enough to make every bone in his hands stand out under his skin. "You swore you'd never speak of this again!"

Bellatrix's lips formed an O of surprise. "Did I? How vewwy odd, I don't wemember that." Tapping a long finger against her cheek, she looked thoughtful. "Maaaybe I'd be able to recall such an odd promise... If I heard you admit that you were wrong, and I was right, and that I've never said anything remotely Muggly."

Gritting his teeth, Sirius ground out a response. "...I was wrong, you were right. You could never Muggle if you tried."

Shrieking with laughter, Bellatrix applauded and stomped her feet on the floor. "Now, say that the Dark Lord is the greatest wizard of all time! Oh, oh, and Godric Gryffindor was a drooling Flobberworm! Say it!"

"So, uh, speaking of Dark Lords, how about that Ekrizdis, huh?" I called out, before either Sirius or Bellatrix did something I'd regret. Their arguments all seemed to follow a pattern, where one of them would provoke the other, and everything quickly spiraled out of control from there. If I was going to spend much more time in their company, I'd certainly get a lot of practice with preventing dangerous situations from escalating.

My gambit paid off; Bellatrix spun away from Sirius, pirouetting around to focus on me, instead. "Ekrizdis was an inspiration to us all! Azkaban is a lasting testament to his exalted power and skill!"

She patted the wall of her cell. "None have ever dared to even attempt tearing down this glorious erection, dreading what hidden terrors might spew forth once they were no longer held at bay."

While Bellatrix wasn't watching, Sirius crossed his eyes and made a rude gesture. Appropriate, given her word choice, but rude.

"Ekrizdis brought forth this entire island from the churning waves of the North Sea," Bellatrix went on, spreading her arms and twirling around herself, dancing on tip-toe in small circles. "Whenever Muggle sailors drifted past in their leaky dinghies, they were drawn in inexorably by the rapturous enchantments upon the place, providing Ekrizdis with fresh subjects for his studies in the Dark Arts." She stopped spinning, giving me a beaming smile. "Why, some of the cutlery you found might once have been used to gouge out the eyes of a Dutch fisherman!"

I stared at her.

Bellatrix stuck one finger in the side of her mouth, yanking it out again with a 'plop'.

Slowly, I pulled the spoon out of my mouth. I placed it carefully back on my plate, then pushed it away.

I remembered to make a small waving motion with one hand, before my crabs took the whole pile away. I'd decide later whether it'd be best to simply dump it all in the ocean.

Sirius picked up his fork, sniffing the tines. He shrugged. "Eh... I've eaten worse."

"Worse, you say?" Bellatrix cooed. "You don't think that's Dark enough for you?" She glanced at me, pulling at her matted hair and watching me through a curtain of long, black curls. "Howsabout you, little OWL-y? Had your fill of gory glory, yet? Nerves feeling jittery, hmm?"

Putting my feet up on the now-cleared table in a show of carefully schooled nonchalance, I waved my crabs off to have them start conducting experiments in soapless, non-scrubbing-brush-based dishwashing techniques. "Oh, don't worry about me. No offense, but your, uh... History lessons, just can't compare to a swarm of Dementors - and those don't scare me, either."

She made a little happy noise and tapped the palms of her hands together in tiny, nearly quiet movements, like she was clapping in stealth mode, or playing solitaire patty-cake. "Oh, goody! A challenge!" She plopped herself down on the stone floor, folding her legs like she was on a picnic. "In that case... Let me tell you the story of the oh-so-honorable Minister Damocles Rowle..."

 **xdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbx**

Padfoot had a big smile on his face, as he watched his worst cousin chatting with Jemima about boring things, like the Dark Arts, and crimes against humanity, and thaumaturgical violations of the natural order, which probably also counted as Dark Arts. What was that word, the one that covered all those things?

Oh, yeah. Girl stuff.

Wait, no. He wasn't being Padfoot right now, he was being Sirius. That was always a good enough excuse for a pune, or play on words. He could make those jokes, now, if he wanted to. Even better, he could want to want to make jokes, if he wanted. Oh, how he wanted to want.

Also, the girl wasn't Jemima, she was... Harriet? No, couldn't be. Lily would have told him if her son was a girl, even though James would have agreed it could be a grand prank, telling everyone that his daughter was a boy. They could have transfigured a tail on her diaper, too, while they were at it. But should it be a boring old deer tail, or something ace, like a tiger?

Oh! Taylor! That's who he was. She was. Yeah.

She did have glasses, and the hair color was about right. She was taller than Jemima, though, and her face wasn't quite right. She really liked books. Lily had really liked books, too. Maybe Taylor could be a Harriet, after all? Her pranking needed more practice, then. She had potential, definitely, but no panache. All those crabs at her beck and call, and he'd never once woken up with one of the little scuttling things sitting on his face, comb in one claw and the other making snip-snip noises at his nose? Such a waste. He'd have to teach her how to Maraud like a proper Marauder.

So, Padfoot was Sirius, and Jemima was Taylor. Oh, but Bella was Bella, can't you smell 'er? One in three wasn't bad. Loads better than he could have managed before Jemima showed up.

Taylor! Yeah, that was it.

He hadn't slipped up like that in front of her, had he? She hadn't said anything. Probably didn't mind, even if he had. That was alright, then.

Good thing he'd gotten all that experience with Animagus transformations back at school. He could stay as Padfoot on the inside, and let Sirius do the talking, like he was the world's first Manimagus. It wouldn't do to let the witches do all the talking, or they'd just keep nattering about stuff like painting each other's toenails with the blood of their enemies. Also, if he was quiet for too long, he'd start remembering again. Loud, louder, Padfoot - that was the way.

How had the girl done it, though? Even when the Wizengamot started having Aurors patrol the prison, years ago, it was only a couple times a week, scant relief from the Dementors. But then, that girl got chucked in here, and now the soul-suckers hardly ever bothered floating past this way, and everything seemed less drab, and dismal, and doom-laden, and other awful things that started with the letter 'D'.

Leave it to Bella to make up for the shortfall by contributing some awful D-words of her own. In this case, designer clothing, by the sound of it.

"...But where did you find that hideous blouse you're wearing? Such unappealing shades of blue and yellow, and the embroidery doesn't even move - why, it's almost as ghastly as the rags the Ministry makes us wear!" Bella gestured at Taylor's new shirt, then glanced down at her own clothes - a traditional Azkaban prisoner's outfit, striped in hues of filthy grey and slightly darker, filthier grey. She pinched the hem with two fingers and pulled it away from her body a little, wrinkling her nose. "And that's hardly an easy accomplishment. If you can get all those crabs to behave like house elves and search the prison for you, and have them bring you anything valuable they find, why don't you just get them to look for a proper set of robes?"

Hmm... If that shirt could make Bella this upset, maybe Padfoot should try to get one for Sirius? Well, ask Taylor if her crabs could find him a spare, anyway. Unless the shirt actually belonged to her, and that was the only one she'd brought. It did look like one of those Muggle blouses that Lily had called a "tea shirt", even though he'd seen her wear them at all times of day, not just tea-time. Had Taylor's crabby little friends found some sort of store room, where the prison guards kept the inmates' personal clothing?

Padfoot and Sirius loathed agreeing with Bella about anything, but she did have a point about the embroidery, or whatever it was on the front; it was a bit jarring to see an article of clothing with such a detailed picture on it, without the decoration being animated in some way. At least Sirius'd had a chance to get accustomed to such things, from the times he'd visited Prongs and Lils after they'd tied the knot and moved in together; moved in with each other, not with Padfoot, that is. He'd lost count of how many times he'd seen his best friend's wife wearing a shirt with a completely immobile, orange cat, that apparently hated Mondays. It was just plain unnatural for any cat to simply stay lying around, when Padfoot was in the room. Maybe the cat would have moved, if he hadn't been so Sirius at the time?

Taylor's shirt was reassuringly free of slouching felines, thank Merlin. Instead, it showed a cartoonish drawing of a lemon, disguised as a blueberry. It wasn't a very good disguise, which might explain why the lemon looked so extraordinarily grouchy. Wait, no. Sour-faced? Yeah, that was better.

...Or maybe it wasn't a lemon, but a potato? Granted, most tubers didn't have arms, or legs, or scowling bearded faces in the middle of their ovoid spuddy bodies. Potatoes did have eyes, though. On the other other hand, they didn't wear blueberry costumes, either, but that round hat on top of the spud actually looked more like a helmet, if you squinted and turned your head a little. A potato, dressed in a suit of blue armor, and wielding a funny-looking fork? No, hang on, Moony had explained about that one, when Lils had tried to explain it without making sense: When a spoon and a fork love each other very much, hand gesture, hand gesture, blah blah blah, and nine months later, you've got a spork.

So, a potato in blue armor, waving a big spork. Did that make sense? It wasn't all that much better than a lemon in a berry costume, but the cartoon plant life had to be a potato; the shirt had a big caption, spelling out the words: 'ARMS-MASHER', and it wasn't as though you mashed lemons, was it? Could that be what made it a true tea-shirt, having a picture of food on it? Why had Lils worn one with a cat on it, then? Although, Sirius probably wouldn't eat a cat, but Padfoot might manage.

The shirt even had one of those white oval thingumies with writing in it, like one of those speaking-bubbles that Sirius had seen in the comic books about _Martin Miggs the Mad Muggle_. Apparently, the aggressive potato was announcing to the world that:

MY ELECTRONICS ARE FULL OF CHIPS

Sirius would definitely have to get Taylor to explain that one; he had no idea what "electronics" were, but he could still smell a pun from fifty paces.

Taylor snorted. "Pretty strong words, coming from a woman who's currently dressed in a way that puts the 'garb' in 'garbage'."

Padfoot grinned. Sirius did the same on the outside, and started applauding, as well. "Who knows? Maybe the house elf-crabs are keeping the best bits to themselves? Can elfish shellfish be selfish?"

Scowling, Bella pulled up her sleeve. She trailed a fingertip down the length of her lower arm. "Hebert... Hebert... Hebert... Aha!" Her muttering stopped when her finger reached a certain spot. She laughed as she jabbed her fingernail into her arm, swiping it lengthwise and leaving a small, red mark on her skin.

"There! That's another ten minutes of Cruciatus for you, once I get my wand back!"

Taylor grimaced. "Lucky me." She murmured something about: "Note to self, polite deference did work better than responding in kind..." Then, she raised her eyebrows and looked over at Padfoot. "Say, how many of those tally marks has Bellatrix awarded you, Sirius?"

Thrusting both fists in the air, Sirius beamed triumphantly. "I've gotten all the way from her left ankle, and most of the way up her thigh!"

After a moment, Padfoot whined in the back of his mind, and nudged Sirius. "Wait, hang on..." He shuddered. "That sounded wrong, once I said it out loud... So very, very wrong!"

"Spare me your tawdry innuendo, Blood Traitor!" Bella sneered, sweeping a bony hand down the length of her malnourished body. "As if I'd ever let you experience the carnal pleasures of my-"

Taylor clapped her hands over her ears. "La, la, la, la...!"

Sirius made gagging noises.

Bella paused, tapping a chipped thumbnail against her teeth with a faraway look on her face. "Your brother, Regulus, on the other hand... He was a proper Pureblood, at least. Served the Dark Lord well, for as long as he lasted." Her gaze slid over to Sirius. She winked at him, and cocked her head to one side, cooing in a sing-song voice. "Not a wotta stamina in your side of the famiwy, is there?"

Padfoot tucked his tail between his legs. Sirius gaped. "Regulus was your cousin, too!"

Bella looked confused. "So? Your parents were also your second cousins, once removed. What has that got to do with anything?"

Finally, Sirius decided to follow Padfoot's example. He ran over to his cot, diving for cover underneath. "Lestrange-ah dange-ah! Lestrange-ah dange-ah!"

"Shut up!" Bella snarled, yanking her sleeve up again. "That's another six-hundred seconds of agony for you, Hebert!"

"Me?!" Taylor cried, throwing her hands up. "What did I do?!"

Narrowing her eyes, Bella licked her fingernail clean. "You were the one who taught him that ridiculous Muggle phrase!"

Sirius whimpered from under his cot. "Could we go back to talking about Taylor's shirt, now?"

"Let's not," said Taylor. "But, uh, we could discuss some other wardrobe contents, if you want? Here, look at these... Are they something that this Ekrizdis guy would have made, or do you think they belonged to one of the prisoners?"

Padfoot (and Sirius) watched from under the cot, as she snapped her fingers, wandlessly summoning more of her crabs. They arrived promptly, carrying something.

She was dashed fond of those creatures. Maybe that would be her Animagus form, if he taught her? Plenty of material for a Marauder name, there. Pincer, maybe? Longclaw, because she was so tall? Would that make her a lobster, instead? Oh! Tweezer! That was basically like a long set of pincers, really.

Hang on, she was a Taylor who was a Harriet who wasn't a Jemima, wasn't she? Damn. Tweezer was too similar to Taylor. That'd defeat the whole purpose of making up a new name.

Mmm. What was Bella getting so excited about? Just looked like a pair of boots. Red boots, at that. Didn't Bella prefer green?

"...Genuine pair of Carabasies! They're as expensive as getting robes from Twillfit and Tattings," his cousin gushed. "Oh, you must let me borrow them! I promise, I'll grant you a quick death, if you do!"

"That's... Um, that's a very, uh, kind offer. I'll... Be sure to keep that in mind," Taylor said. "Anyway... If they're that costly, they might have been meant as a bribe, too, at some point. Don't know why they were left in a corner for me to find, though." She turned the boots over in her hands. "Maybe an inmate tried to bribe an Auror guard with them, and the Auror decided that cherry-red footwear didn't match with those fancy vermilion uniforms they wear?" She squinted, holding the boots closer to her eyes. "Or is this ruby? It's hard to tell colors for sure, in this gloom."

Padfoot sniggered, while Sirius whispered "haahd ta tell calahs fah shuah" to himselves. Taylor's accent got even stronger, and funnier, when she got excited, or upset. He stopped, when he realized what it was Taylor had found. That was enough to make him go from giggles to a full guffaw. "Oh, that's perfect!" Sirius cried. "You found yourself a pair of Offer-Pedic' Boots!"

Taylor gawked at him, all big eyes and big mouth and really big bout of bewilderment. "...Huh? You mean, orthopedic boots? Is that what they are?"

Sirius grinned. Padfoot wagged his tail, but only on the inside. "That's not what I said."

"Oh, my goodness gracious," said the left boot. "You people look _dreadful!_ When was the last time you had a shave and a haircut, two bits?"

The right boot piped up. "Or just one bit?"

"Or just a wash, even? Don't take this the wrong way, sweetie, but your pong is starting to, uh, pung," said the left boot.

"No time to waste, girlfriend! Put us on, and we'll put you through the wringer! Trim your toenails," said the right boot.

"Chisel off those layers of dead skin," said the left boot.

The right boot wriggled, like it was nodding. "Your bunions will be soft as a Plorlomphie's bottom, by the time we're finished with you! Remember, good hygiene is the gift that keeps on giving!"

"Cleanliness is next to witchiness!"

"Proper grooming gets you zoomin'!"

"...I thought it was 'booming'?"

Taylor sighed. "I think I understand why these were left in a dark corner."

Bella perked up. "If you don't want them, I might be persuaded to take them off your hands."

Taylor frowned. "...Well, I don't really need boots that remind me when I need to wash my feet, since these days, that's 'all the time', but Mom might like them. Maybe I could... I dunno, give them to her when she gets permission to visit? Or just smuggle them out, and mail them to her, somehow?"

Bella snorted. "Didn't you say that neither of your parents were magical?"

"So what if they aren't?" Taylor frowned. "The ca... The wizards who run your society might be obsessed with secrecy, but they'll still have to let my Mom know they've thrown me in prison, right? Otherwise, she... She'd just keep asking questions, trying to find out what happened to me, and that would... Just..." Her voice faltered and died.

"Oh, you silly Mudblood!" Bella laughed. "Did you really think you still have a Mummy?"

Padfoot had stopped wagging his tail, or anything at all. Sirius recognized the look on Taylor's face. He'd worn it often enough. "Bella, don't you dare-"

"S-shut up! My mom wouldn't..." Taylor clenched her fists. "She wouldn't disown me, just because someone told her that I was in jail for -"

"Haven't you never ever heard of Oh-blee-vee-ay-shun?" Bella tilted her head to the side, slapping the top side with one hand, like she was trying to knock the last drops out of a bottle. "The Ministry has special people, with special spells, widdle OWL-y... And when they tossed you in here like a piece of nasty rubbish that they wanted to get rid of, those special wizards paid a visit to your sad, helpless, common-as-muck Muggle of a Mummy-"

Padfoot ran up to the bars in front of his cell, as close to Bella as he could get, and tried to grab her, or claw her, or bite her. Sirius was shouting, trying to drown out her voice. But Padfoot couldn't reach her, and she just shrieked louder.

"...And when those special people were done, she would be utterly convinced that you were dead as a doorknob! Why wouldn't she? She'd remember seeing your mangled corpse, with her own two eyes! Vivid memories, with colors, and smells!" Bella held a hand to her mouth, eyes wide. "Unless the special people got lazy, or they were in a hurry..."

Taylor's face was wet. Her eyes were squeezed shut, leaking anyway, and her nose was running, and the drops went flying every time she shook her head.

"Maybe the special wizards did a sloppy job! But who cares? It's just a Muggle, so who cares if she forgets that she ever had a Mudblood daughter? The special wizards would be doing her a favor, really... Because when they were done, there wouldn't be a single bit of you left in your Mummy's head! Every memory of you, just: Pffft! Gone! Painted over with other bits and pieces! The Mudblood sprog can't complain about it, 'cause she's you, and you're in Azkaban!" Bella howled with laughter.

"Isn't that something? Your Daddy is dead, and your Mummy thinks you were never even born!"

Padfoot watched as Taylor curled up, hugging her knees to her chest where she sat on the floor. Her reddened eyes locked on him. "Is it..." She choked and sniffled, wiping her nose on her sleeve. "Is it true? What she said?"

Padfoot tried to think of something to say. Sirius had always been good at lying to people when he was at school, especially when those people were teachers, and their questions went along the lines of: "Did you do it?"

Somehow, it didn't seem like it would work on Taylor, or maybe it just seemed wrong to lie about something like this. Unfortunately, his drawn-out silence appeared to end up speaking volumes, as far as Taylor was concerned. She bent her head, resting her face on her knees and hiding behind her long hair. A long, low keening noise was heard, followed by wretched sobbing, as her shoulders shook.

"Psst! Mudblood!" Bella stuck her arm out between the bars. Her fingers were clenching and opening, in a 'gimme, gimme' gesture. "If you don't want the boots, and you don't have anyone else to give them to...?"

The world exploded in noise.

Part of it was Taylor, stumbling to her feet and grabbing the boots. With a piercing scream, she threw them at Bella. Bawling and weeping and gasping for breath, Taylor - who was Harriet who wasn't Jemima but who was collapsing onto her cot - curled up in a ball and stopped being anything other than pain and misery.

Part of the noise was Bella, letting out a surprised yelp as she got hit by a boot, the other one landing on the floor. The boots were upset by this development, too, judging by their shouting.

Part of the noise came from the crabs. Part of it was probably coming from Sirius, and Padfoot, as well.

But the biggest part of the noise, the bit that drowned out all the rest, was the triumphant, rasping, screeching howls of every Dementor in Azkaban, bursting through the heavy oaken door and flooding the hallway.

 **xdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbx**


	3. Gall

**Whilst I Linger On Top of the Land:** **Gall**

 **xdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbx**

The hunger floated above its territory, and smelled that it was good.

Most of the old food still had plenty of nourishment left, and the newest food had finally stopped causing trouble. The other hungers were pushing and jostling, trying to get at the warmest and juiciest bits of the new food, but this hunger was a young hunger; it knew it wasn't as strong or as cunning as the older hungers, and knew it couldn't compete with them. It had learned that the hard way.

So, instead, the hunger bided its time, and settled for some of the older food. It knew this old food quite well, from the many times it had tasted it before. Its flavor was bitter, and sour, and sharp, but still sweet enough to be worth the effort.

"Dromeda," the food said. It was talking in a way the other food called 'moaning', the hunger knew. Food often did that, when the hunger was having a taste. The hunger didn't know what a 'Dromeda' was, but this food often moaned about it.

The food moaned other things, too:

"Dromeda, why?"

"P-please..."

"Kill him..."

"He's a Mudblood, Dromeda, don't do it..."

"Why? You... Why do you love him more than you love your sisters?"

"Find other husbands... Other misters..."

"Kill him for you, set you free..."

"Please... Don't do it..."

"Don't leave me..."

So many noises. So much moaning. On, and on, and on. Didn't the food get tired?

The hunger drifted over to the next food. It was another old food, but an odd one. Most of the time, it was not-food. Sometimes, the food would be food, but never for long. It was tricky, tasting food that was almost never there.

Right now, the food was food. It was also making noises, but not the noises it usually made. When it was not-food, it sometimes growled, or whined, or howled. When it was food, it made the same noises, but they sounded like words: "James" and "Lily" and "Harry" and "Wormtail", and "sorry", always "sorry, sorry, sorry".

Now, the food wasn't curled up in its hiding place under the lying-down-thing. Bed? Maybe. Yes. It wasn't under its bed. It wasn't making its usual noises. Today, the food had crawled up to the sticks that kept the food penned in. Was it trying to escape? No, just making noises at the new food, in the next pen, where all the strongest hungers were feeding.

"Taylor," said the old food. "Hang in there," and "you can do it," and "don't give up", and noises without words.

Now, the old food wasn't food anymore. The not-food limped back towards the rear of its pen, crawling back under its bed. It still smelled like fear and pain and defeat, but none of the warm smells that the hunger liked to taste. That was annoying. The hunger hissed, disappointed that it couldn't feed on the old food, now that it was not-food.

Maybe the hunger should fly back to the other old food, with its Dromeda? Or down in the other parts of the hungers' territory, where all the other food was?

But the poison-foods got upset when the hungers fed too much on those foods. The poison-foods said that those foods were "low-security inmates", which meant the hungers weren't allowed to feed on them as much, or as often. The poison-foods made a lot of demands like that, but they also brought plenty of food, so the hungers went along with it. The poison-foods also brought their big-poison, which the hungers didn't like at all, so the hungers had learned how to not get caught doing things that upset the poison-foods.

The big-poison was soft, and warm. Much too warm. It burned the hunger worse than the warm air outside the hungers' territory. The hunger had heard the food make noises called "sunshine", and "daylight", when they talked about the burning warmth that lurked outside the territory. The food also said that the poison-foods' big-poison was "glowing", with "bright light". Maybe all glowing, shining things were bad for you?

The hunger wasn't sure what "glowing" or "shining" meant. The hunger had no eyes, which was good, because that meant it didn't have to feel the warm things burning it through the eyes it didn't have.

Days and days and days ago, the poison-foods started invading the hungers' territory more often; not to bring food, just to look at the other foods. The poison-foods always brought their big-poison, which made the hungers sick.

Once, the hunger had heard one of the foods talk at another food about a thing called "foie gras". It was made by taking a not-food called "goose", or "duck", and feeding it with "grain" and "corn" and other things. Even when the goose-duck was full, and didn't want to eat anymore, it was fed more and more, pushed down its throat. Then, the goose-duck's "liver" grew big and fat and juicy, and the food took out the liver and ate it.

The hunger thought the big-poison might be like that - it was soft, and much too warm, and it made the hunger feel full and not-hungry in a very bad way. This was why the big-poison was so awful. The hunger should not be foie gras. The hunger should eat foie gras - big and fat and juicy food, full of good, nice, happy taste.

The only good thing about the poison-foods invading the hungers' territory so often, was that the hungers didn't have to look after the foods all the time. Days and days and days ago, the hungers had to give the food "gruel", so the food didn't get so thin and weak that they became not-food. Sometimes, the foods got so upset, they stopped taking the gruel, trying to become not-food so the hungers couldn't feed on them anymore. Then, the hungers had to push the gruel into the food, and help them "chew" and "swallow". Maybe that meant those foods were foie gras, too?

Now, the poison-foods made sure the foods took their gruel, and the hungers only had to help some of the time. The poison-foods also dug the holes outside the hungers' territory, where they put the foods in the ground when the foods were all used up, and they became not-food.

This was dumb. The poison-foods must be dumb, for doing such a dumb thing. The hungers did it right. When one of the hungers got too old, and fat, and full of tasty things it had found in the food and eaten, the other hungers would take it. The old hunger was too fat and too slow to get away, which was how you could tell it was ripe.

Then, the other hungers took it aside, and filled it with eggs, and soon, a new litter of hungers could feed and grow strong, until they were big enough to fly and feed on their own. The foods were just dumb, when they kept throwing things away. Or maybe you couldn't lay eggs in a food, when it had become not-food?

At least the poison-foods had stopped demanding that the hungers should dig holes with their bare claws. Now, the poison-food dug their own holes.

The hunger smelled a fight brewing, and listened closer. The older hungers were squabbling over the new food. That food had been more annoying than all the other foods and poison-foods put together.

First, the new food had been good to feed upon.

Then, the new food had started causing trouble. Lots and lots of trouble. The worst part was when the hungers started choking, and were forced away from the food. That meant the hungers couldn't feed on the new food, or on the old food that was sometimes not-food, or the old food that was always food. It had to be the new food doing it, because none of the other food smelled like they had the poison-sticks that spat out big-poison.

The new food was not a nice food. The choking, and the pushing, and all the other things it did - none of them even felt like the big-poison. They were much, much worse.

Now, the new food was food again, and the hungers could feed, and that was good.

Now, one of the older hungers had caught hold of the new food, gripping the food's "hair" in one claw. The old hunger was pulling the new food closer to the sticks in front of the pen, that kept the food separate from the hungers. Was the old hunger going to true-feed, eating every tasty thing inside the food in one go? That was disappointing, because the hunger wouldn't get to feed on the new food any longer, and the poison-foods would be upset when they found out, because the new food hadn't tried to escape from its pen, so the hungers weren't allowed to true-feed. It was also good, because the new food had caused a lot of problems, and once the old hunger had true-fed, the new food would be still and quiet and not-food.

Now, the old hunger had pulled the new food close enough to true-feed. The other hungers were trying to shove it away, so they could get a chance to true-feed, but the old hunger was strong, and held on. Now, the tastiest thing was coming out of the new-food. The hunger could smell it, even from this far away. Now-

...Big-poison! That meant there were poison-foods, invading!

The hunger retreated, hissing and snarling, along with the other hungers. One of the poison-foods ran over to the new-food, but the hunger didn't stay to hear what happened. The poison-foods would be upset, and that was always bad for the hunger's digestion.

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A/N:  
Dementors (i.e. monsters that feed on happy memories and positive emotions) being vulnerable to the Patronus Charm (a spell that's powered by a strong, positive memory) is a curious incongruity that I've never quite been able to grok. The foie gras theory is the best explanation I've come up with, other than ones that can be summed up as "because MAGIC".


	4. Strum

**Whilst I Linger On Top of the Land:** **Strum**

A/N:  
Thanks for all the reviews and comments! Also, since there probably won't be another update until January: Merry Christmas, happy holidays, feliz navidad, best wishes for the new year, etc.! More notes after the chapter. Now, on with the show.

 **xdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbx**

"...Think she's still alive, sarge!"

"Bloody buggering Baatezu! If she ain't about to expire this instant, then get your sorry arse over here, and gimme a hand! Never seen Dementors this riled up, before!"

The voices were familiar, in a vague and superficial sort of way. Forcing one eye open, I saw blurry figures rushing around, and two glowing white shapes flying hither, and here, and everywhere. It was hard to tell what the luminous figures were - my glasses must have gotten knocked off, at some point - but one of them was tiny, while the other was huge. Whenever they soared past, I felt a surge of warmth inside me, filling the void and pushing against the-

No. Didn't help thinking about that, now. Just push it all out, disperse it, spread it thin. Plan B hadn't worked, so a return to plan A would have to suffice, for now.

After a while, the clamour of screeching and shrieking died down. Footsteps came closer.

"Cover me, constable."

Something tapped against metal - the bars lining my cell? - followed by a complicated sound that made me think of tapioca pudding, sloshing and glooping around in a mould. The footsteps walked all the way up to me, and I saw a red figure crouching beside me. Fingers, slim but strong and calloused, grabbed hold of my jaw and forced my mouth open. Something was placed on my tongue; something sweet, and chocolate-flavoured.

"Chew, then swallow," said the figure. Female, going by the voice. "Can you do that for me? It's just the cheap stuff from the wholesaler in Diagon Alley, not one of Honeyduke's, but you'll feel better, once you get it inside you."

I tried, but my mouth didn't seem up to the task, right then. After a few seconds, the figure sighed, and waved something at me.

" _Gurgulione Sorbillas_."

The sugary morsel on my tongue went from 'slowly melting' to 'completely liquid' in a fraction of a second. The fluid wriggled around inside my mouth, and forced itself down my throat. The unsettling sensation almost made me cough on reflex, but somehow, the liquid made its way down my oesophagus without any of it going down my windpipe. The flavor wasn't entirely pleasant, and the feeling of runny chocolate moseying down my throat was even less so, but it did seem to take the edge off all the gloom and doom that was swirling in my mind.

"There we go," said the woman in a brisk voice. "First time I've ever had to force a teenager to eat sweets. Guess I should mark my calendar."

"The majority of the people who end up in Azkaban are over the age of majority, sarge," said the second voice, from further away.

The red-robed woman half-turned, her blonde ponytail swaying. "Alright, constable. You've made your point." Her voice was calm, but had an edge of finality to it. She faced me again, raising one hand in front of my face. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Uh..." Voice cracking, I swallowed a few times and licked my dry lips. I winced when my tongue brushed against the cracks in the skin on my lips, but my grimace might not have been noticeable; I was already squinting, struggling to make out definite shapes. "...Two?"

The woman sighed, and shook her head. "Blurry vision isn't an uncommon symptom, after a Dementor-assisted out-of-body experience, but you probably ought to see a healer, just to be on the safe side..."

"Er, sarge? I think she usually wears spectacles," said Constable Obvious, somewhere out of my field of vision. If he kept being that helpful, I'm sure he'd make captain in no time.

"Is that so? Well, _Accio prescription glasses_ , then," said the sergeant.

Something came zooming up from the floor, landing in her hand. She held the item up to the light, studying it. As far as I could tell, she was, in fact, holding my glasses now. She pulled a white handkerchief out of some hidden pocket, or possibly out of thin air, and wiped the lenses of my glasses. Glancing at me, she leaned closer and scrubbed at my face with a part of her hankie that I really hope was clean. Once she was satisfied that the filth on my face had been redistributed more evenly, she slid my glasses onto my face. With most of the dried tears and gunk cleaned out of my eyes, my vision got far less blurry. The glasses helped, too.

Like every other Auror I'd seen, the woman was dressed in a red outfit that was an eclectic mixture of clashing styles - part old-fashioned military uniform, part bathrobe. The outfit wasn't kept completely in the same shade of red - the illumination in this cell block was usually wicked awful, but right now, there was a clean, white light, emanating from some unknown source; thanks to that, I could tell that the Auror sergeant's uniform robes were probably a muted vermilion, with highlights and trim in brighter crimson.

As for the woman herself, she appeared to be a short and slender thirty-something, with blonde hair scraped back in a simple ponytail. Still, when you were dealing with card-carrying (well, wand-waving) Parahumans, it would be a foolhardy mistake to underestimate someone for looking mostly harmless.

...There was probably a joke in there, about her militarized bathrobe needing a towel to really look mostly harmless, or something like that, but I wasn't in the mood to work out the details.

The sergeant had a jagged scar across one cheek, from below the corner of her mouth to the edge of her ear, that implied she'd been through hard times and still stayed standing, and a glint in her eyes that suggested she'd be entirely willing and able to arrange for others to have a hard time, whenever necessary.

She held up a finger in front of my face again. "How's your vision? Any better?"

"Yeah," I rasped. "Thanks." When she wiggled her finger from side to side a little, I managed to croak out a "One," as well. Apparently, my voice wasn't up to more than single syllables, at the moment. That seemed fair, after the fresh bout of screaming I'd been doing.

The woman stood up from her crouched position beside me, and brushed the dust off of her robes from where she'd rested on one knee. "There we go, then. You'll live to serve your sentence."

The other Auror walked up, pausing outside the bars to my cell. "Maybe we should still have a healer examine her, sarge. She's-"

"She's a convicted felon, constable," grumbled the sergeant. "She got chucked in the 'Ban for using an Unforgivable Curse. Do you reckon we should tuck her in, and get her a nice soft teddy bear to cuddle, while we're at it?"

"Wouldn't work," said a hoarse voice that sounded even worse than- ...Well, okay, _almost_ as bad as mine. "The Crepundiacreo Ursimollis Charm is specialized enough that they don't teach it until NEWT-level Charms, and you two knuckle-draggers probably got into Auror training on the traditional Ministry triple-whammy." There was an arpeggio of wet coughing, followed by a throat being cleared, and finally, a brief spitting noise. "Two lackluster OWL exams, plus nepotism."

The female Auror spun towards the source of the voice and stalked away from me, heading across the hallway. I noticed that some of the bars in front of my cell had been bent into an intricate, compact shape, like a large metallic Gordian knot clinging to the ceiling, leaving an opening large enough for the Auror to walk through. On the way out, she waved the stick in her hand, muttering something under her breath.

The knotted metal bars shuddered. Then, they unfolded like a flower bud blooming, accompanied by the same sound of distressed tapioca pudding that I'd heard earlier. Undulating down to the floor, the metal bars anchored themselves and shuddered once more before growing still, looking as straight and solid as ever.

Sirius was sitting by the bars to his cell, staring up at the female Auror. When she stopped in front of him, he reached up with two bony fingers - index and middle - and pulled down one of his lower eyelids, baring a bit more of his bloodshot eye. Vaguely, I recalled that Brits used two fingers when they flipped someone the bird, rather than just the middle digit, like normal people did.

Sirius stuck out his tongue at her for a few seconds, for good measure. "Morning, Thriftermath. Fine day to be torturing innocents, don't you think?"

The Auror, Thriftermath - was that even a name, or a lisp? Did Sirius lose some of his teeth to a Dementor? - balled her hands into fists and rested them on her hips. "You tell me, Black. You and your cousin would know better than most, I expect."

She tapped her wand against her thigh and turned her head a little, glancing over at Sirius's cot. "Pretty unusual, seeing you showing your face when the Dementors are roaming about. Shouldn't you be hiding in some dark corner, nook or cranny?" She raised her empty hand, rubbing her chin. "Y'know, most kids are worried about monsters lurking under their beds. Kinda fitting, in a place filled with Dementors and other creeps, that _you_ would be the thing under the bed."

Sirius yawned. "Sounds like someone got up on the wrong side of the bed, this morning."

Thriftermath shook her head. "Just so you know, it's late afternoon, but there's still time left in the day for me to show you a few of the things I learned at school. Got to put those lackluster OWL exams to good use, y'know?"

I couldn't quite see her face from this angle, but the tone of her voice gave me the impression that she must be wearing a rather shark-like grin at the moment.

She brushed her baton against the bars to Sirius's cell, the wood striking the metal with a _peng-peng-peng_ noise. Twirling the stick in a sort of triangular pattern, twice, she tapped it against two of the bars.

" _Stipitecaedo_."

Whipping around like the tentacles of an enraged squid-monster, the two metal bars wrenched themselves free from the floor and snaked up at Sirius. One of them wrapped around his chest, hoisting him aloft and shoving him up against the wall. The other bar of living metal stretched out alongside its twin, reaching up to tap against Sirius's forehead.

Thriftermath twitched her magic stick.

The metal bar pulled back from Sirius's head, then lunged forward again, striking with a deafening _crack_.

I tried to scream, or shout; the cry bubbled up in the back of my mind, but barely any of it made it past my lips. Just a faint wheeze, or maybe a sob.

Did she just...?

No!

Maybe it wasn't too late - if I used my crabs as a distraction to delay the Aurors, I could help Sirius - but I didn't have nearly enough termites available right now; or worms, or wood-eating beetles, or anything else I could use for the anti-wand countermeasures I'd been planning, and the Aurors could probably take me out easily, since my body felt as responsive as an overcooked noodle, and-

"Oh, no." Sirius's voice was flat and bored. "Spare that brick. It's my favorite."

...Wait, what? He wasn't... Sirius hadn't been...?

Pinned up against the wall by one of the animated metal bars, Sirius stared at the female Auror through half-lidded eyes. His head was entirely unharmed, and not crushed or punctured in any way - his face was intact enough that he could even pick his nose without problems, as evidenced by the bony finger currently digging into a grimy nostril - while beside him, the other moving metal bar was wrenching itself free from the wall. Dust and stone splinters crumbled from the indentation it had left in the brick, where it had struck.

Oh. So, uh... Ah. Scare tactics. Right.

Probably just as well that I'd held off on unleashing a localized crab-pocalypse, then.

"Careful, Black," muttered Thriftermath. "You lot got lucky today, since my constable is a stickler for protocol. He insisted that we should check up on the Dementors, make sure they weren't having too much fun in here."

She rubbed her fingers together around the wand, rotating the wooden stick along its axis. The unencumbered bar of animated metal promptly responded, twirling hypnotically back and forth in a narrow circle. "Keep reminding me of just how long a streak of piss you are, and your luck might have run out, next time."

Pulling his finger out of his nose, Sirius inspected the tip, then flicked it at the Auror Sergeant. Before any of the nasal detritus could hit her, she swayed her wand to the side, and the metal bar moved between them to block Sirius's boogers. "Nah, you'd never let me die as easily as that," he said. "You're not that merciful... If that's the right word for it. You're convinced I'm guilty, so you want me to suffer, for a long time."

"This again?" Thriftermath snorted. "Innocent people don't get a lifetime sentence in Azkaban."

Sirius scowled, baring his teeth. "The word 'sentenced' implies that there was a trial, at some point - that's a luxury that I was never afforded."

"How original!" Thriftermath laughed. "I've only heard that one from about half the prisoners, in here."

"Ever consider that some of them might be, y'know, telling the truth?" Sirius drawled.

"Yeah, sure," said the Auror. "After all, criminals are renowned for being honest and trustworthy." Thriftermath swiped her wand from side to side, muttering something that sounded like: "Fee-nee-tey."

Dumping Sirius on the floor, where he landed with a 'whumph' of expelled air, the two animated metal bars snaked back into place, turning utterly rigid and vertical like the other bars, once more.

Sergeant Thriftermath turned to the other Auror, a guy who looked far more like a stereotypical security guard, or a bouncer: Big, tall, and broad-shouldered. Probably the kind who played football at school, or whatever the wizardacious equivalent might be. Delayed Blast Fireball Rugby, perhaps?

"All done, constable?" Thriftermath asked the beefy Auror.

"Dementors seem to have calmed down, sarge," he said. "Not sure why they dragged a bunch of driftwood in here and built a table out of it, but the mess was easy enough to clean up. None of the prisoners have been Kissed, it seems."

Thriftermath shrugged. "Saves us a fair amount of parchmentwork, if nothing else. As for the table... We'll put that in our report, and let the higher-ups worry about it. Might end up being a matter for the greycloaks; they'll probably wet themselves with excitement, down in the Dee-oh-Em, when they hear that the Dementors have developed table manners." She narrowed her eyes and turned her head slowly from side to side, scrutinizing the corridor. "...Unless the 'table' was some sort of primitive trap, meant to trip us up and slow us down, so they had more time to feed."

She clapped her hands together. "Alright, let's get back to the Ministry."

As the two Aurors walked over to the large oak door, a couple of glowing figures swooped down the hallway to follow them. I'd seen those things several times by now, whenever an Auror patrol trundled through Azkaban; yet somehow, every time I saw them was as marvelous as the first. I harbored a suspicion that it might be a part of this particular projection power, that no matter how many times you saw these Patronus animals, you never lost any of the sense of wonder and serenity that they somehow instilled by their mere presence.

Today, they even helped me keep my mind off... No. Don't go there. Think about animals, instead. A hammerhead shark, and a tiny bird. Some sort of sparrow, maybe?

Right before the Aurors left, the sergeant turned to look back at Sirius. "Do try and keep away from the Dementors, Black. Next time they try to snog one of you lot, we might not be around to stop them in time," she said. "Your cousin Tonks is on the fast track to graduating from the Auror Academy with flying colors, and it'd be a shame if you ended up as a soulless husk, before she had a chance to go on her first patrol, here."

Thriftermath smiled. "Do you think she'll spit you in the eye, first, or wait until after she's kicked you in the goolies a few times?"

The heavy oak door slammed shut behind them. Without the calming light of the Patronus projections, the prison hallway was plunged back into murk and gloom.

Sirius rubbed his chest, where the metal bar had grabbed him. "Only spitting and kicking? Sounds like a type of cousin I could get along with."

He winced, and looked to the side. I followed his gaze.

In the neighboring cell, Bellatrix was sitting curled up on the floor, knees pressed under her chin and her arms wrapped around her legs. She was staring at me, unusually silent, eyes glittering in the dim light provided by the glowing runes that had been carved in the ceiling. According to Sirius, those arcane scribbles were part of Azkaban's ward scheme, the magical security system that kept the prison running. They also happened to be basically the only light source in here.

When she noticed that I was looking at her, Bellatrix loosened one arm from hugging herself, and reached down beside her. Without saying a word, she flung the red boots at me. It was a weak toss, intentionally so; I didn't try to dodge, if I even could have, in my current state, or muster my swarm for a counter-attack.

The boots landed in front of my cell, one of them rebounding off of a metal bar and sliding back into the corridor a little way.

"Will you people stop throwing us around?!" One of the boots shrieked. "It's making me so dizzy, I feel like throwing up!"

The other boot sounded even more shrill and outraged. "Ooh, well, I never! We won't stand for this!"

"No! And we wont take it lying down, either," cried the boot that had landed on its side.

"We weren't made to be tossed around, you know!" The second boot hollered. "These boots were made to give people high-quality pedicures, I'll have you know!"

"...And for walking," said the first boot.

"Yes, alright, that too," the other boot grumbled.

I tuned out their bickering, and focused on Bellatrix. After tossing the boots back at me, she'd turned away and slouched over on her cot, lying down with her back to me.

...What? Seriously, what the hell?

What was that? Was that supposed to be some sort of half-assed apology?! 'Whoops, sorry, here are your boots back'? After what she did?! After what she _said_ , about m-

...No. Don't go there, not now. Think about something else. Focus on how I could tear her to pieces with crab claws, let the lice and fleas go to town on her epidermis, bring in the flies I'd collected, have them lay eggs in her-

...No. No, no, no, no, _no_. Absolutely not. I would _not_ stoop to her level. I'd survived Winslow, and never succumbed to the temptation to shred any of my tormentors from the inside out with a million tiny mouths. I wouldn't sink so low, here and now, not because of some miserable old _bitch_.

I took a deep breath. It probably wasn't an apology, anyway. Bellatrix wouldn't know what that word meant, if two dozen crabs bit her on the ass and then carved the letters A-P-O-L-O-G-Y into her flesh with-

...I exhaled, slow and controlled. No. Bellatrix had just gotten bored with the fancy footwear, when their constant chatter started to get on her nerves. Or maybe she soiled herself from fright when the Dementors charged in through the door, and she didn't want to keep the boots after she'd dribbled inside them.

Hah. As if I'd be that lucky. Bellatrix was too insane to truly fear anything.

Maybe I should keep the boots, anyway? Just to annoy the Lestrange bitch? Obviously, I wouldn't wear them, if she'd actually peed in them, but...

I glanced at the boots again. I felt the corners of my lips quirk, in what might have been a smile, or might have been something else. With a fair amount of effort, grunting, and swearing, I managed to wrestle myself back up in a position on my cot that could, with a charitable interpretation, be called 'sitting'.

I knew exactly what I was going to focus my concentration on, for the next few hours.

 **xdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbx**

A/N:  
As an added writing challenge, I've decided that, when I cook up new spell incantations, the verbal components should be as close to genuine Latin as possible, while still sounding sufficiently Potter-esque and vaguely silly. For example: "Gurgulione Sorbillas" is derived from words meaning "part of the throat where the swallowing happens", and "drinking in small sips", which seems suitable for a force-feeding spell. "Crepundiacreo Ursimollis" contains words that can be shuffled around to write a sentence like: "I make a soft and bear-shaped toy". And then there's "Stipitecaedo", or "I clobber (you/someone) with a stick", or, as in this case, "with a metal pole".


	5. Tremors

A/N: Right on time for Valentine's day, here comes a double chapter with lots of (talking about) kissing!

 **Tremors**

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"Pahple and yellow."

Padfoot leaned a little to the side, sticking his head past the curtain to watch Jemi- ... _Taylor_ , as she played with her new toys.

"Red and green."

He frowned. "Uh... Don't you think red and gold would be a better combination? It's just, red and green... They don't always get along, y'know?"

"Because they contrast so wicked strongly with one anothah, you mean?" Without looking at him, Taylor shrugged. "Hmm... Maybe. If you say so. Red and gold, please."

Seconds later, a bunch of insects emerged from inside the Carabasie boots, their hard shells gleaming crimson and gold. The colorful bugs leapt, flew, and scuttled away, making room for a couple of crabs that were climbing into the boots.

"Blue and orange."

One of the Carabasies sighed, sounding even more put-upon than the previous half-dozen times it had huffed and groaned in the last twenty-odd minutes. "Honestly, sweetheart, this kind of usage is gonna void our warranty!"

"Yeah, this is definitely not what we were designed for," wailed the other Carabasie. The expensive footwear shuddered, as the pair of crabs - now with a fiery orange and deep blue shell, respectively - clambered back out of the boots' shafts.

"Don't get me wrong, I simply _adore_ your creativity and artistic spirit, but, uh..." The boot's laces fluttered limply in the air, giving the impression of someone who was trying to fidget without fingers - or limbs of any kind, for that matter. "Maybe you should stick to having us Color-Charm your toenails? We're _good_ at toenails."

"Don't worry," said Taylor. "You're doing fine. Insect carapaces aren't so different from toenails, really. At least not in regahds to size."

Padfoot smelled an opportunity, and nudged Sirius in the back of his mind. Their mind. Whatever.

"...Um, is that so? Bugs and toenails are identical, you think? Good thing I'm wearing socks, then."

"...Pahple and yellow."

No reaction. No giggle, no snort of annoyed amusement, not so much as an eye-roll at his weak attempt at humor.

Padfoot sighed.

"White and black, please."

One of the Carabasies growled and rustled its laces, as another pair of Color-Change Charmed crabs scurried out and away from the boots. "At least give us a bit of a challenge! All primary or secondary colors, and no stripes or polka dots, makes us a dull pair of galoshes!"

Taylor lifted her shoulders a little and let them drop again, in a listless shrug. "Sure."

Another crab and a small swarm of bugs made their way inside the boots in an orderly fashion.

"...Turquoise and ochah."

The Carabasie boot sighed for the eight time.

Padfoot lowered his ears, whining but determined. Sirius cleared his throat. "Listen, Taylor... About, uh... About your Mum..."

Taylor turned her head, studying the wall. "I wonder how Dementahs reproduce. Have you evah thought about that?"

Padfoot's ears twitched. Sirius stared at the girl, wide-eyed.

"N-not to mention the question of wheah they get those tatteh'd black cloaks they all weah," she said, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.

The tracks of wetness down her cheeks glittered faintly in the dim light. Sirius wished he had a handkerchief to offer. Padfoot suggested licking her face, before he remembered that it only worked when he was actually being Padfoot. When he was Sirius, licking people's faces often turned out to be a Sirius mistake, especially when the lickee in question had dozens of little friends with claws and pincers that could leave a lasting impression on the tongue of any stray lickers, regardless of how well-meaning their intentions were.

Besides, he was too far away. There was a little, nagging voice in the back of his mind - one that probably wasn't Sirius, and definitely wasn't Padfoot - telling him that, maybe, just maybe, he was getting too old to go around licking teenage girls. That was a shame. It'd been one of his favorite pastimes, back during his N.E.W.T. years at Hogwarts.

Pausing for a moment, Taylor glanced down at the Carabasies and muttered: "Pink and viridian." Once she'd checked that the bugs came out the right colors, she resumed her wall inspection.

"Perhaps they steal the cloaks from the people they've drained? There's plenty of animals that use similah strategies," she said in a flat voice. "Lacewing lahvae, for instance. Did you know that they camouflage themselves undah a layah of random debris, including the remnants of theiah previous victims? Then, they can sneak around in the tree branches, disguised as harmless rubbish, while they hunt for juicy prey, and once they catch something, they can suck it dry with theiah hollow jaws."

She glanced down at the Carabasies. "White and black, please."

For once, the footwear made no complaints about the small swarm of bugs that marched inside them, although both of the boots visibly trembled.

"Lacewings, sure, great," mumbled Sirius, struggling to think of something to say. "Eh... Oh! If you slice pickled lacewings into smaller pieces, you can use them to brew a Symphonic Flatulence Potion!"

He frowned. "...Or were you supposed to use dried lacewings, after you've ground them into fine powder with a mortar and pestle?"

Where was Snivellus, when you finally found a way for him to make himself vaguely useful, for once?

"Of course, many lacewings lay theiah eggs in a sort of string, or stalk." Taylor rambled on, as if she hadn't heard a word that Sirius had said. "Some of them make egg-stalks that are U-shaped, with an extra egg separating each length of the U-shape from its neighbahin' stalk. Green and pink. The crabs in the boots, I mean, not the eggs."

She watched yet another batch of bugs swap places with their already color-charmed fellows. "Anyway, I'm not really sure why the lacewings do that, because from an evolutionary viewpoint, it doesn't necessarily make sense. Once the eggs have hatched, the lacewing lahvae tend to go on a bit of a, a, a..."

Taylor's jaw moved silently, before she visibly swallowed. "...A cannibalistic feeding frenzy, you see, which makes it hahd to imagine that the baby lacewings who hatch laytah than the first one would survive for long in those U-shaped egg-stalks, even if the first lahva is slowed down a little while it snacks on its spare siblings."

Padfoot sighed. Apparently, Taylor's chatterbox tendencies got stronger when she was in denial. "Right. I get it," he grunted. "Bugs are horrifying little monsters, and they're awful at playing happy families."

Taylor frowned, then shook her head. It looked like she'd distracted herself enough with all that talk about weird insect trivia that she'd stopped crying. Still wasn't looking him in the eye, though.

"That's not true," she said. "Just look at, uh..."

"Please no more lacewing stories, please no more lacewing stories," chanted one of the Carabasies.

The other boot whimpered. "D-do you think she picked them because we have laces? If we'd had buttons, maybe she would talk about... Button beetles, or what have you?"

"Look at the Hippoboscids," said Taylor. "The louse flies." She shot a quick glare in Sirius's general direction. "And before you start: I said _louse_ flies, not _house_ flies."

Both Carabasies let out sighs of relief, which were quickly muffled by an intrusive quartet of crabs and a murmured "Red and gold," from Taylor.

Padfoot whined. Sirius frowned. "Why would I say anything about house flies? That joke is awful, even by my standards."

"When they reproduce, the mother Hippoboscid only has a single offspring," said Taylor. "Which she carries inside her body, where it receives nourishment from her milk-glands."

"Speaking of mothers..." Sirius tried again, leaning a little more to the side. "Your Mum might not-"

"That's sohta similah to how humans and other mammals do it," said Taylor, talking louder than him. "Only, the louse fly maggot-baby is inside somethin' called a prepuparium, which hahdens and turns into a propeh pupa."

Padfoot whined, and Sirius faltered. The Carabasies were stitched from sterner fabric, it seemed; they started talking to the trembling girl in soothing tones. "It's gonna be okay, Tay-Tay babygirl. Whatever might have happened to your Mum, we can-"

"T-that takes a tremendous amount of effort for the Hippoboscid-mama!" Taylor shouted, droplets trickling down her face and falling off her chin, landing among the mob of obscenely colorful crabs and bugs that carpeted most of the floor in her cell. "S-since the maggot is often heaviah than her, so she really sacrifices hehse-"

Taylor's voice cracked, as she made a half-choking, half-sobbing noise in the back of her throat. She pushed a fist to her mouth, biting a knuckle, and shivered in silence.

"I'm sorry," whispered Sirius. "I should have told you about... About what the Ministry might do to your Mum..."

There was a complicated keening noise from Taylor, who was hiding her face behind her arm. The sound might have meant "Shut up," or might have meant "I'm a little teapot, short and stout, here is my handle, which I'm going to use to muffle my screams".

"I just didn't... I never..." Sirius sighed, a long, tired noise. "At least I might have been able to explain it in a way that wasn't so hurtful, like the way that B-"

"S'okay, don't worry about it." Taylor hiccupped, talking in a hurried fashion, drowning out what Sirius had been about to say. "I'm sorry, too."

Padfoot covered his eyes with his paws, in a dark corner at the back of his mind. Sirius shook his head. "What do you have to apologize for?"

"Dementahs," she mumbled, hunched over and hugging herself. "Shouldn't have let 'em in, all at once. Didn't want to think about... I just thought, if I let them bring up all my other shitty memories, maybe it would... I dunno, maybe I could focus on those, instead. I'm _used_ to those."

Padfoot's eyes got very wide. Sirius wasn't sure if he should lean closer, try to hear precisely what the obviously crazy girl was mumbling; or if he should slink further back in his cell, as far away from her as he could get. In the end, the two impulses cancelled out, or maybe he was frozen with indecision. Either way, he stayed very, very still.

He cleared his throat. "...What."

Taylor sniffled, and scrubbed her eyes with the back of her arm, again. "What's what?"

"Uh... What Mr. Black is trying to say, I think," said one of the Carabasies in a hesitant tone. "Is, eh... You didn't _let the Dementors in_ , did you? I mean, they must have gotten in on their own, r-right?"

With a snort and a head-shake, Taylor made a beckoning gesture. The heavy oak door clicked open, and four Dementors floated into the hallway.

Taylor had been using less hand-waving and finger-snapping, lately, when she ordered her crabs and bugs around, Sirius realized with a rather light-headed feeling. She'd barely used any at all, after she almost got her soul sucked out by an over-eager Dementor. Maybe she was getting better at using her wandless magic?

...Or, maybe, she'd been holding back all along, pretending to need the gestures, and forgot to keep up the charade when Bella and the Dementors gave her something else to worry about?

"I can't really control them directly," said the ever-more terrifying girl. "It's more like... Puppeteering, in a way."

She clapped.

Three of the Dementors raised their hands to their shadowy hoods; one held them in front of where its eyes ought to be, the second pressed its long-nailed hands to the sides of its hood, like it was plugging its ears, while the third covered its shriveled lips with both hands.

The fourth Dementor held up one hand behind its neighbor's hood, two fingers extended, giving it bunny ears.

Padfoot whimpered. Sirius opened and shut his mouth a few times, burbling slightly.

Yep. _Definitely_ holding back.

"I don't care what you say, or do, or bribe me with," whimpered one of the Carabasies. "I'm _not_ going to Color-Charm _those_ creatures - even if they have more toenails than the crabs!"

Taylor waved her arms in the air, conducting an invisible orchestra while she hummed a Muggle tune under her breath. "Relax," she said. "I don't think they even have legs; not human-shaped ones, anyway. But... I can still... Get them to do this..."

Twirling around in the air like a troupe of near-perfectly choreographed ballerinas, the four Dementors gnashed their jaws and spat out angry, hissing, snarling noises. Clearly, they'd never had any ambitions about performing like this in front of an audience, and resented Taylor for making them take dance lessons. Or something.

Padfoot started wagging his tail, as everything began to make sense, again. This was all a _dream!_ Of course it was, people didn't just twiddle their fingers at a Dementor and made it pirouette. Even Voldemort or Grindelwald couldn't have done that! Oh, what a load off his chest - he could just lean back, and enjoy the show.

Jolly good performance, really. Sirius clapped and cheered, leaning a little farther to the side to get a better view of the entertainment, as the Dementors bent their arms and contorted their wraith-like forms to spell out letters in mid-air.

Y, then an M, and a C... Was that an upside-down V? No, hang on, the Dementor was twisting its head sideways. Must be an A, then.

"I know that song!" Sirius laughed. "Say, could you make them spell out, uh... Z-K-B-N, instead?"

One of the Carabasies chuckled nervously. "Did you have a lot of happy memories at school? 'Cause I think the Dementors must have sucked out your ability to spell."

Padfoot barked a happy bark. Sirius followed suit. "Sing along, bootsies! One, two, three - it's fun to stay at Hotel Azkaban, it's fun to stay at Hoh-te-e-el Azkaban!"

Sirius had never thought he'd be saying a sentence like that, let alone that it would be true; nonetheless, now that Taylor had arrived and dragged them all the whole way into the madhouse, Padfoot found himself grinning and laughing and wagging his tail more than he'd done in years.

Especially once Taylor solved the spelling difficulties by bringing in three more Dementors. Seven sashaying soul-suckers were enough to spell out A-Z-K-A-B-A-N.

 **xdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbx**

A/N: Taylor seems the type of person to pick up all sorts of random tidbits and curious trivia about bugs, when she's researching ways to leverage her powers. My favorite resource for all things entomological is Drhoz's LiveJournal. His blog posts are a highly entertaining font of bug-knowledge; any errors in this story's depictions of lacewings are entirely my own.

(Drhoz also posts hilarious RPG actual play transcripts from his campaigns, and other nerdy stuff, e.g. jokes about how Voldemort became famous for losing a game of "Got Your Nose" to a one-year old.)

Some replies to reviews and comments:

 **Rem:** Very true! That would be unpleasant. Hmm... The Latin version would likely be something like: "Ede Id, Crasse", or "Comede Id, Crasse". If one of the characters in the story invents a Patronus Charm 2.0, that might have to be the incantation for it.

 **JackSI:** If a Dementor was assaulted by Thriftermath's shark Patronus until it triggered with a bud from Taylor's QA, it could end up with shark-manipulation (and shark- _levitation_ ) powers. Then, Soul Sister would be a Dementor with a sharknado power... (Omake material? _Omake material_.)

 **Grim Troll:** Very neat speculation. Also, " **Taylor Hebert is Ninety-Five Percent Melted Glass** " would make a fine Power Metal song title.


	6. Estimates

**Estimates**

 **xdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbxdbx**

"This is triffic!" Sirius chuckled, swaying with laughter as he leaned to the side. "I can barely even feel the Dementors draining my good mood! Seven of them in here, doing a legless can-can, and they're hardly chilling the place at all!"

"Yeah, it took a while to figgah that one out," said Taylor. Her index and middle fingers changed pace, twitching and flicking faster than before.

Floating upside-down, the Dementors stopped swinging their arms like a handstand can-can. Instead, they flailed their limbs in a hectic dance that reminded Sirius of something he'd once seen at a party, when a couple of exchange students from Durmstrang got properly sloshed.

"Wait, hold on, sweetie," said a Carabasie. "Um, I mean... Girlfri- ...Uh, Miss Hebert?" Clearing its nonexistent throat, the boot tried again. "Are you saying that you can stop the Dementors from sucking out people's happiness?!"

Taylor grimaced. "Well... Sort of? Not completely, though." She pushed up her glasses, and rubbed the bridge of her nose. "I'm not controllin' the Dementahs, I'm... Givin' ordahs to the parasites inside them. Although, since Dementahs are a type of parasites in theiah own right, drainin' energy from people, I guess that means the woahms inside the Dementahs are a kind of hypahparasites..."

Padfoot paused his celebrations, the chuffed look rapidly draining from his face. "...Dementors have tape worms?!"

"Eh... I haven't seen the parasites, but the impression I get from them is more like lahvae, or maggots," said Taylor. "They're kinda... Alien, almost. It took a while for me to realize they were even _theah_ , let alone work out how to control them. They're squirmin' around inside the Dementahs' bodies, which means I can get the woahms to push the Dementahs around."

She illustrated her point with a few hand gestures, wriggling her fingers in the air. "Blockin' theiah aura powah is an extension of that. Dementahs seem to absohb ambient heat and happy thoughts through the surface of theiah whole body, but especially through theiah mouths."

Padfoot shuddered, leaning a little less to the side. "Right. The Dementor's Kiss."

Taylor shrugged. "So, if I want a Dementah to reduce its drain, I can just..."

She raised her hands, miming that she was choking someone. Thankfully, the Dementors didn't follow suit. "...Get a lot of maggots to wriggle up into its throat, and then _squeeze_..."

One of the Carabasies moaned. "I think I just threw up on my insole, a little."

"That makes sense, if you think about it," said the other Carabasie. "Dementors already look like corpses, right? Stands to reason that they'd have some sort of maggoty creatures crawling around inside them, gnawing on their-"

The first Carabasie started making gagging noises. "Yep, definitely gonna need my insole cleaned."

"I can't stop the Dementahs' energy-drainin' powah completely," said Taylor. "Unless maybe if I got one of them to dunk its head in the ocean, and waited for it to freeze into a solid block of ice..."

She trailed off for a while, looking pensive. "...Yeah, that might work. Assumin' they don't actually need to breathe, I guess."

She took off her glasses, and one of her crabs handed her a scrap of very-nearly-white handkerchief. Taylor started scrubbing the lenses of her glasses clean. "Anyway, paht of the problem is that theiah whole body seems to be involved in the process, but also because, well... If I squeeze moah, the Dementahs just suck hardah."

Sirius shuddered. "Nine words I never wanted to hear with my trousers off."

One of the Carabasies grimaced. "Bleurgh! I'm so glad that Taylor was able to get those drapes hung back up, after they got torn down by rampaging Dementors, and bumbling Aurors."

"Yeah, nobody wants a second glance at that view," sniggered the other boot.

"Hey, now," whined Sirius, shuffling his feet a little, trying to find a more comfortable way to stand with his lower body hidden behind the drapes in his cell, while still being able to see the boot he was talking to. "It's just really cold in here!"

"Keep telling yourself that, luv," cooed one of the Carabasies. "Just so long as you stay behind that curtain."

"C'mon, can't I come out, yet?" Sirius grumbled. "Those seamstress-weevils must be done mending my trousers, by now. Besides, I'm getting a crick in my neck, having to lean sideways to see what's going on!"

Taylor growled. "Will you shut up, already? Your trousers are almost finished. And for the love of all that is holy, stay where you are, until you're fully clothed, again!" Her voice trailed off, muttering something about "man-children", and "probably hafta get him a diapah", and something that might be a string of Muggle swear words, judging by her tone.

"That's right," cried a Carabasie. "We don't need to see your crick - or any other part of you, below the jawline!"

"Aw, calm down, pet," said another Carabasie. "Pay no attention to the ugly, bare-arsed wizard behind the curtain."

Taylor waved one hand, and a scuttling horde of crabs and insects approached, carrying Sirius's trousers. The ragged, grimy fabric looked even more like it belonged in the trash, compared to the bright backdrop of gleaming, multicolored shells.

While Padfoot watched, countless tiny bugs marched back and forth on top of his trousers, dragging spare threads and weaving them in and out. The last gaps in the seat of his trousers, the final remnants of what had recently been a rather large tear in the cloth, were stitched closed within moments.

"There," said Taylor. "Good as ne- ...Well, good as wicked old and very heavily used, at least. I don't know how you managed to rip your pants like that, and I don't want to know."

"It's a wossname... Instinctive response," mumbled Sirius. "When Thriftermath pushed me up against the wall, I began to-"

Taylor held up a quelling hand, wincing in disgust, while Sirius's newly mended trousers were thrust at him by a squadron of shiny pink, purple and yellow crabs.

"I said, I don't want to know! If you're about to explain how the scary Aurah frightened you so much that you pooped yahself at ballistic speed, I don't wanna heah it," she hissed. "If you're going to talk about yah seedy kinks and pahvahse hobbies, and how much you enjoy bein' tied up and havin' a blonde chick shout dubious Latin phrases at you, and how yah... _excitement_ somehow managed to teah a hole in the _back_ of yah pants, I _definitely_ don't wanna know."

"Bondage, and talking dirty with obscure words?" Carabasie no. 1 whispered to Carabasie no. 2. "Is that what they call, y'know... _Encyclo-masochistic?_ "

Padfoot growled. Sirius rolled his eyes, scowling. "It's not like _that_. I just have a... Fight-or-flight response, that was really keyed up, today."

"Fight ah flight?" Taylor quirked an eyebrow. "Is that another wizahd thing? Some sorta... Emahgency flyin' broom deployment?"

Sirius barked a laugh. "Wouldn't have worked, even if that was the case. Most of Azkaban is layered in transport-restriction wards, including Anti-Broom Jinxes."

Carefully expressionless, Taylor stared at him, as he poked his head out from behind his privacy curtain. "You know, I was jokin' about the flyin' brooms... Or at least, I thought I was."

One of the Carabasies piped up again. "If it wasn't a broom, and it wasn't... Y'know, _boom-boom_..."

Taylor groaned, covering her face with her hands.

"...What was it, then?"

About to put his trousers back on, Padfoot paused before Sirius had pulled them all the way up. He was pretty sure that he'd been able to keep his Animagus form secret from Bella, since the wall between their cells blocked most lines of sight; they were really only able to see each other when they both stuck their heads out between the bars to scream at each other.

Taylor, on the other paw... Hand, whatever... She might have caught a few glimpses of Padfoot, when he was changing shape. Clever young sprog, too; she'd likely figure it out on her own, whether he told her or not.

Besides, this was just a crazy dream. Couldn't hurt to brag about his Animagus prowess a little, could it?

Turning sideways, so his back was towards the edge of the curtain, Sirius bent slightly forward, and let Padfoot wag his tail - on the outside, this time.

One of the Carabasies sniggered. "Well, at least it's not a crick."

Squinting against the gloom for a moment, Taylor eventually leaned back where she sat on her cot. "Oh. _That_." She nodded. "Makes sense, I suppose... Except..."

For a moment, she looked as though she was going to ask another question, like she'd just thought of something else that didn't make sense to her - honestly, her magical education so far must have been fairly nonexistent - but then she glanced over at Bella's cell, frowned, and closed her mouth without saying anything.

Padfoot dragged his tail back inside. Sirius slumped, then huffed as he yanked up his trousers. Didn't anyone appreciate a perfectly executed partial Animagus transformation, anymore?

...Well, _nearly_ perfect. Full-body Animagus transformations would transfigure your clothes, as well. Too bad that wasn't always the case with partial transformations.

Decent once more - on the outside, at least - he cleared his throat. "Thanks for, y'know. Patching up my trousers."

"Don't mention it," said Taylor. "Just stay fully dressed, and refrain from making the obvious pun about my name, and I'll considah it payment enough."

"Pun?" Sirius blinked at her, trying to look innocent despite Padfoot chuffing with amusement in the back of his mind. "What pun? ...Ohh, you mean, because you're called _Taylor_ , and you just used your wandless magic to repair my clothes, like a-"

Seven Dementors floated up in front of him, forming a neat line in the hallway, all pointing a warning claw at him. Seven rasping hisses filled the air, sounding barely half as ominous as Taylor's calm voice, saying: " _Don't_."

"Gnk," said Sirius.

One of the Carabasies let out a nervous giggle. "You could travel with that act."

"Hey, that's right!" Carabasie No. 2 said, sounding excited. "If you can shake the Dementors around like maracas, thanks to those maggoty things, you could escape from this place, easy-peasy!"

Taylor nodded, grim-faced, while the Dementors yanked at the bars; even though it started to turn white with frost from the Dark creatures' presence, the thick metal didn't budge.

"That's the plan," she said. "The prison wahdens won't be much of an obstacle for me, anymore, so now I just need to..." Her nostrils flared as she took a few deep breaths. "...Miraculously find some kinda magical bugs that eat metal, or... Or _some_ way of getting out of this cell."

Padfoot's mind was awhirl; what a cruel daydream, this was! A chance to get out of this place, to track down little Peter and turn him into a Perm-tail? A chance to find Harry and go on adventures together, as godson and dogfather? And it seemed so real, too! Oh, how he'd hate waking up from this... Maybe the Demen-Taylor girl wasn't the only one who tried to indulge in a few delusions, to keep the nightmares at bay?

Still... Might as well see what surprising twists and turns his mind had in store for him. Would be rude not to, when it had gone to all this trouble, and both Padfoot and Sirius preferred to be rude on purpose.

"I could get you out of the cell..." Padfoot heard Sirius say. "If you get me a wand."

Taylor's stare was equal parts suspicion and intense scrutiny, when she turned her head to look at him. "...I suppose you'd want to come with me, if I tried to escape?"

"I'd be a liar or a fool, if I said no," Sirius said, scratching his scalp behind one ear. "Come to think of it, sticking with you for a while would be safer. Escaping from Azkaban carries an automatic penalty of being Kissed... Not that anyone's ever broken out of here before."

"The way you pronounced 'Kiss', with a capital K, makes me think that you're eithah talking about rock music, or something wicked ominous," said Taylor. "I guess you're talking about the Dementahs, then?"

He nodded. "Normally, the Dementors aren't allowed to suck a prisoner's soul out, unless the inmate makes a break for it. The Aurors might be tightening security, soon, now that one of the Dementors almost Kissed you."

"Well, then." Taylor folded her arms. "Is this the paht where you try to convince me that I can trust you?"

Padfoot sniffed the air. Sirius stared at Taylor. Her gaze and posture were stern, grim, unyielding - like her heart bore a vulnerable spot that was vast and painful, and she desperately wanted to hide that fact. She looked like a child who'd been deeply wounded, betrayed by the whole wide world, or very nearly so.

Unfortunately, Padfoot and Sirius knew those feelings all too well.

"Whether or not you trust me as a person," Sirius rasped, struggling to think of how Moony or Lils might have handled this. "You can trust my motivations... Because I want the same thing that you want."

Find what was left of his family and friends. Make sure that his godson was safe. Track down the treacherous scum who'd stabbed them all in the back, and pay him back tenfold.

"Good work, Padfoot," he imagined Prongs and Moony saying. "Don't say all those last bits out loud, though. You've already told her about all that, and it sounds more impressive if you don't repeat yourself."

"She doesn't look like she's ready to put her fears about her mother into words, yet, either," said Dream-Lily, tugging on Padfoot's leash in the back of his mind.

Wait, when did he get a collar? Typical Lils, always trying to rein them in, just when they were having fun.

Taylor must have caught his meaning, even if he didn't catch it, himself, until he imagined his friends explaining it to him. The tall girl shuddered, closing her eyes, then took a deep breath. She nodded, rubbing at her eyes with three fingers.

"Alright," she said in a low voice. "Time to staht makin' a plan, I guess."

"...Y'know, fugitives need proper footwear," said a Carabasie, sounding hopeful.

"That's right!" Carabasie No. 2 chimed in. "What with all the fleeing and escaping and running away that they do."

"Fine, sure, whatevah," Taylor groaned. "You can tag along, too."

While the boots cheered and celebrated, her annoyed expression turned thoughtful. "What you said, about othah inmates bein' innocent... People who had a mistrial, or no trial, and were wrongfully imprisoned... Do you think we should try and rescue some of them, while we're at it?"

"If you can scrounge up some Veritaserum, or can think of another way to check if they're telling the truth about being innocent," Sirius mused. "Also, most inmates can't cope with being around Dementors for long. Anyone who's been in here for more than a few months... Well, let's just say that we're going to need a way to carry them out of here, and all the way to shore."

"Keep an eye out for anyone with a Dark Mark on their arm!" Carabasie No. 1 stage whispered. "That means they're a Death Eater, you know."

"Unless they're one of the poor saps that You-Know-Who branded with fake Dark Marks, to sow confusion," Sirius grumbled. "You'd need to know what the Dark Mark looks like, for starters. Pretty unoriginal, really; it's a picture of-"

His voice faltered into silence, as he saw the swarm of bugs and crabs begin to congregate. Seconds later, the creepy-crawlies had coalesced into a large and eerily recognizable outline.

Sparkling emerald shells and other bright green bugs and crabs were at the forefront of a long, undulating shape. Darker greens, blues and purples were at the sides of the writhing mass, like shading on a painting, making it appear darker in some spots.

Above the thick swarm-tendril, a rounder shape had taken form. Glistening white crabs and sulphurous yellow bugs made up the bulk of the near-spherical assembly, accompanied by critters charmed silver, and gold, and other pale metallic shells. Again, bugs whose shells bore darker hues were used to add shading to the figure; slate grey, ochre and orange.

Both the large pale ball in mid-air, and the long greenish rope underneath, had been given the impression of having eyes - narrow yellow slits in the green shape, above white fangs, and large black patches, like empty sockets, in the rounded white shape. The latter even had fiery crimson dots in their centers, like pupils that moved from side to side, creating the illusion that the swarm-shape was searching the hallway with its hateful gaze.

As Sirius watched, and Padfoot howled and whimpered in the back of his mind, the mass of squirming, chittering insects and crabs had swiftly organized themselves, with great neatness and precision, into a two-part symbol. They filled the air with an almost palpable buzzing noise, that could just as easily have been the hissing of a tremendous serpent.

A giant snake-tongued skull, born of teeming vermin, the dread Dark Mark of She-Who-Must-Be-A-Dark-Witch-After-All, now floated in the grimmest corner of Azkaban.

Adding four Dementors, shaking their clawed hands in the air at the Dark Mark like a bunch of Hufflepuffs cheering for their favorite Quidditch team, did not, upon closer reflection, make the spectacle any less horrifying - despite the cherry blossom-pink crabs latched on to the Dementors' bony hands, like mittens that failed to be warm, or soft, or... Almost any of the things you'd expect from a pair of mittens, really.

Quite often, Taylor had complained about the scarcity of bugs around Azkaban. If this was what she considered to be "wicked few insects", Sirius was starting to suspect he'd be having new nightmares about what she could do with a "sufficient" number of her extra-creepy crawlies.

Granted, a closer look revealed that the skull and serpent weren't massive; more like a thin layer of bugs and crabs, creating a hollow shell with the illusion of solidity. It didn't look quite like the whole shape of the skull was present, either, just the front half facing towards him. Was she using a couple of spare Dementors as scaffolding for the skull, with brightly colored insects piled up on the monsters' backs, to make the soul-sucking creatures look more terrifying?

...Huh. Yet another sentence he'd never expected he'd ever use, before.

"This is what the Dahk Mahk looks like, right?" Taylor said. When he didn't respond, she followed his gaze, and winced a little. "Yeah, okay, the Dementah cheerin' squad may have been a bit ovah the top. Not sure if you even have cheahleadahs, here in jolly old England, so the crab pom-poms were probably a waste, but that whole: 'Ooh, I'm so edgy and hang out at bikah bars with a snake coming out of a skull' thing just looked like it needed a touch of colah."

Sirius rubbed at his throat. "Collar... Er, colour. Right."

Padfoot glanced up at the scintillating rainbow-hued skull-and-snake-shaped swarm of bugs. There was probably any number of comments he could add to that, but he wasn't sure if Taylor would hear anything he said over the sound of his own skin crawling.

Oh, and the screaming. Wait, who was doing that? Was Sirius screaming? No, he was Sirius, and Padfoot was pretty sure that he'd know if-

...Ah. Right. Bella was at it again. What was she shrieking about now?

More importantly, what had Bella been doing in her cell, while he was busy trying to cheer up Taylor? His worst cousin was rarely quiet for long, unless she was up to something. What had set her off this time? Taylor had just been putting on a Dementor puppet show, and making an impressively colourful yet literally louse-y Dark Mark. What could Bella have-

...Oh, _bugger_.

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A/N: As mentioned in the previous chapter: Happy Valentine's day! (Low on romance, though, unless you count whatever was going on inside the Dementors...)

Poor old Padfoot fell victim to a notorious clichéd pitfall of the superhero genre: Wardrobe malfunctions.

Several people commented on how Dementors and Patronus charms work. Many of them argued (very convincingly) that Dementors don't feed on happy thoughts, but are sustained by misery, and make people depressed because that bleak atmosphere is beneficial for the Dementors. (Kinda like terraforming, only done to people's minds instead of planets.) I'm not going to retroactively change that part of the story, though; there aren't many fanfics featuring a Dementor PoV, and I'm terribly amused by the thought that the chapter might be the only one of its kind, and then turn out to be completely wrong.

Some other replies to reviews and comments:

 **twocubes:** Elegant summation! And yeah, it's heart-warming like a Blood-Boiling Curse. Come to think of it, perhaps one of the future chapters ought to be called "Serrated Slice of Life", or "One Order of Hurt/Comfort (Hold the Comfort)"

 **Luke Dragneel:** Just one or two? Your hopes are quite modest, sir. The production rate would probably be very low with so few, unless Taylor can get some magical boosts.

 **rednaxela12:** Approximately 16,777,216, at a rough estimate.

 **osterreicher97:** Thanks for all the detailed reviews and comments! Taylor likely knows about the Kingsmen and the Suits, but the name "PRT" may have become an automatic stock phrase for her - like how wizards sometimes call police officers "Muggle Aurors".  
Also, regarding the Ministry's penal policies: It gets worse when you consider that not all inmates get life sentences, which means that some of them probably survive long enough to go loco from Dementor exposure, and then get released to go their merry way. Regular jail time can make it very difficult for convicts to rejoin society; Azkaban likely makes it impossible.


	7. Paddlelessness

**Paddlelessness**

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Panda smiled and applauded, when the huge octopus grabbed her friend and held the squat witch aloft in one of its muscular tentacles. "Well done, Oglethorpe! You are, indeed, a very good boy, who has definitely earned an extra whelk for supper."

The witch sitting beside her in the boat - an Auror Sergeant, mm... Brandi Thriftermath, or possibly Bianca - shot her an incredulous look. Panda recognized the expression immediately - people looked like that all the time, when they talked to her.

"You're not, ah... You're not really going to feed it, are you?" Sgt. Thriftermath fingered her wand, watching the flailing tentacles and the squealing witch overhead. The Auror twitched a little, every time either of those things got too close to the small dinghy where they were sitting. The octopus's excitement was adding even more waves to the choppy ocean waters, sloshing up against the sides of the boat.

"Feed it with whelks, I mean." Thriftermath glared up at the squealing witch in the octopus's clutches, and continued in a low murmur. "Wouldn't particularly mind if you tried to make it eat _her_."

Panda blinked at the odd, nervous woman. "Yes, of course I'm rewarding him with whelks. Why ever not? Do you think he might prefer mussels?" She tilted her head. "You know, my local fishmonger often claims that large mussels make you stronger. I'm concerned that he might think he's being witty, rather than tiresome."

Sgt. Thriftermath thrust a hand at the octopus, waving wildly. "It's just a conjured creature! I watched you cast the spell, myself! You don't need to feed it, just vanish the bloody thing!"

"That's a terribly short-sighted view of the world," Panda chided her fellow traveller. "The fact that _he_ isn't real, is not proof that his _feelings_ are unreal, as well."

Reaching into her robes, Panda rummaged through her Space-Expansion Charmed pockets. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the Auror shaking her head, and muttering under her breath.

"Oh, dear..." Panda murmured. "It appears I'm fresh out of whelks. I suppose poor Oglethorpe will have to settle for limpets, tonight."

She felt a tugging on her sleeve, and looked up. One of the other passengers was studying her anxiously - a large, broad-shouldered Auror Constable called... Turpitus Bumphrey? Bulgaria? Something like that.

"Pardon me for interrupting you, ma'am, but..." He pointed up in the air. "...Shouldn't we help the Undersecretary get down again?"

Panda blinked slowly, studying his fingertip closely. Then, she looked up, following the direction he was pointing. "Oh, yes. Dolores isn't yelling so much, any longer. She's probably finished having fun."

Sticking two fingers in her mouth, Panda ignored the two Aurors whispering to each other ("...She thinks those screams of terror sounded like the Undersecretary was having _fun?!_ "), and let out a piercing whistle.

Oglethorpe lowered his tentacle, gently setting down the witch he'd been carrying. She yelped, and sputtered, and struggled to straighten out her pink robes.

"Hem, hem!" The short Undersecretary shook her finger under Panda's nose. "This sort of behaviour is _completely_ impermissible! If you can't keep your conjurations in check, Unspeakable, I shall personally recommend to Minister Fudge that you should be assigned mandatory bonus duties in the Department of Wizarding Waste and Refuse Disposal! Not to mention a remedial course in basic Transfiguration safety measures! I have _never_ witne-"

"Don't worry, Dolores," said Panda in a soothing tone. "Oglethorpe was just keeping you safe, by making sure you didn't fall overboard."

" _Fall overboard?!_ " Dolores's eyes were bugging out, even more than usual. "I didn't even get a chance to set foot in this... This rickety old bucket of a row boat, before that impertinent creature _grabbed_ me!"

Panda nodded, a pleased smile on her face. "That's right. He knew exactly what you wanted him to do, and he did so."

Dolores took a deep, shuddering breath, and plastered a sickly smile on her face. "Hem-hem," she simpered. " _Excuse_ me? I could have _sworn_ you just said that I _wanted_ a giant tentacle monster to... To _violate_ my _person_?!"

"You shouldn't swear in front of Oglethorpe, Dolores." Panda frowned. "He's less than five minutes old. He's still a baby."

She reached out her hand, and gave her distraught friend a comforting pat on the shoulder. "But, yes. You did encourage him to pick you up. After all, you were the first to point that there wasn't room for all nine of us in this little boat. He volunteered to help, by carrying you instead."

The squat Undersecretary huffed and spun around, turning away from Panda. She glared out across the dark and unfathomable waters passing them by, as their tiny boat cut across the waves. Dolores studiously avoided looking at Oglethorpe, as well, even though the huge octopus waved at her a couple of times, as it swam alongside the boat.

It sounded like Dolores was muttering something under her breath, about "stark raving madwomen", and "sodding greycloak cretins", and "bleeding thrice-accursed Department of Morons".

Oh, the poor dear. Dolores must have been under a lot of stress, lately, if she was swearing this much. Maybe it would be a good idea to bake her another gwornfrattler pie, to cheer her up?

Her plans for making her friend feel better were interrupted, when Thriftermath jabbed an elbow in her ribs, and leaned closer to whisper in her ear.

"That was _brilliant!_ " Thriftermath sniggered. "I've never seen anyone wind her up like that, before! And she can't really get shirty about it, and go tattling on you to her dear Cornelius, 'coz you were so nice and polite about it!"

Panda tilted her head to the side. "I'm always nice to Dolores. She's my best friend."

The Auror stared at her. "...Are you serious?"

When Panda nodded, Thriftermath shook her head. "You're _mental_ , you are. That woman isn't anyone's friend."

Panda shrugged, and went back to her introspection. She had eight seconds of relative silence - the churning ocean and brisk wind still filled the air with noise, of course - before Thriftermath's elbow reacquainted itself with her ribs.

"Hang on," said the Auror. "Did you just say there were _nine_ of us?"

Panda counted them all on her fingers again, just to make sure she hadn't made an error in her calculations. It was always so annoying when that happened, and - on one highly memorable occasion - potentially very nearly fatal.

"Yes, fellow traveller." Panda held up both her hands in front of the Auror, only one middle finger left extended. "Nine."

The two witches turned to look at the constable, when he suddenly started coughing. Once he noticed them both staring at him, his coughing fit segued into umm'ing and ahh'ing.

"Erm, uh..." He stuttered. "W-well, y'see... I was just thinking that... I guess nine fellow travellers were too many fellows, for this little fellow-ship? Y'know?"

He chuckled awkwardly, glancing back and forth between them, and twirling one of his index fingers in a circular motion. He also mumbled something that might have been "bring", or "wring". When both of them just continued staring at him blankly, he cleared his throat and fell silent, joining Dolores in gazing quietly out across the waves.

Muggleborns could be so _odd_ , sometimes.

Thriftermath rolled her eyes, and went back to scowling at Panda. "Why do you keep going on about this 'nine'? By my count, there's only _seven_ of us!"

Panda shrugged. "In that case, one of us didn't do the math right, and I'm fairly sure I didn't didn't. Perhaps you _did_ didn't, and didn't realize?"

The Auror sighed. "You, me, Turp and the Undersecretary make four in the boat, plus the three others over there." She stabbed a finger in the direction of Oglethorpe. "See? Shack and Abbott are riding on the squid, along with the ferryman..."

"Mr. Salty," said Panda. "He asked for my autograph, you know. I've never been a celebrity before. I do hope it doesn't give me a swelled head."

Thriftermath grimaced, and massaged her temples. "Merlin forbid it should be swollen, as well as _empty_." She opened her eyes to resume glaring at Panda. "That wasn't an autograph book, he wanted you to sign a _liability waiver_ , so the Ministry can't sue him if your bloody squid sinks the boat, and... You know what? Never mind."

Thriftermath poked Panda's collarbone with a callused finger, and growled. "Look, this ain't Arithmancy, just common sense! Unless you're counting the squid as two people, there's no way that four Aurors, an Undersecretary, an Unspeakable, and a wrinkly old Squib _ferryman_ can add up and make _seven_."

Panda looked down, and started searching through her pockets again. "Mmm... No, I'm not counting Oglethorpe. He's technically a transport-er, and not a transport-ee. Although, you're correct in assuming that one of the seven people you mentioned, is currently counting for more than one."

A pair of strong, but slim hands gripped Panda by the shoulders. She looked up, and saw that Thriftermath was eyeing her intently.

"So," said the Auror. "Did your oh-so-friendly octopus knock up Umbridge, and now she's carrying twins?"

"No...?" Panda sat back, wide-eyed.

The constable started making choking noises.

"Darn!" Thriftermath snapped her fingers with a grimace of disappointment. "That would have been _great_ gossip material for the next blether session, back at the Auror bullpen."

She leaned against the small boat's railing, hands folded behind her head, closed her eyes, and sighed. "Oh, well."

After a few moment's silence, the broad-shouldered constable reached out to tap the sergeant on the shoulder. He stopped himself before he made contact, finger hesitating in the air for a second. Then, he shifted his pose, and coughed into his fist.

"Er... Sergeant?"

"What is it, Turp?" Thriftermath answered without opening her eyes.

The constable's uncertain tone seemed at odds with his deep voice. "...Aren't you going to ask the Unspeakable what she meant, when she said that the seven people here count as nine? The staff in the Department of Mysteries have access to detection spells and rituals that the rest of us don't, so maybe..."

"Nope." Thriftermath yawned, and adjusted the way she sat to make herself comfortable - or as comfortable as she could get, at least, when she was jostled around in a tiny dinghy, tossed from wave to cresting wave by its magical propulsion. "She's being _cryptic_. I ain't in the mood to deal with that kind of nonsense, when I know there's gonna be even _worse_ nonsense waiting at the end of the trip."

The constable opened his mouth with a rebuttal, but before he could say anything, another voice butted in on their debate.

"...Excuse me? Are you done arguing about that whole 'seven or nine' business, now?"

Three heads turned, following the sound of the voice.

Next to the boat, riding on the back of Oglethorpe, the wizened old ferryman known simply as Salty (or, if you were as polite as Panda was: 'Mr. Salty') was cupping one hand around his mouth. His other hand kept a desperate grip on the huge red octopus, struggling not to be swept over-squid into the frothing ocean, while he shouted to be heard over the noise of the elements.

"Only, I'd quite like to ride in the boat, again, if'n that's a'ight with you!" His frantic eyes darted down, shooting the huge octopus underneath him a worried glance. "N-not that there's aught wrong with yer squiddy! Ver' nice, ver'... Uh, friendly-like! But, eh.. Mebbe one a' you lot would wanna swap seats, or summat?"

Panda looked up from the occultoscope she'd been fine-tuning, and crammed the arcane device back into in one of her pockets. She shot an uncharacteristically stern glare in Mr. Salty's direction. "Absolutely not! Out of the question!"

The old ferryman looked crestfallen. "Wha'?! Why not? There's room for one more in the boat, easy!"

Thriftermath opened one eye a crack, looking between the bickering people. "He's got a point, you know. That bloke is skinnier than a broom handle, he could fit in here, no problem."

Panda folded her arms under her chest, and shook her head. "I'm sorry, Mr. Salty, but you get to ride this boat all the time. These two Aurors do not make this trip every day..."

"Only every other day," muttered Thriftermath, rolling her eyes.

"...And I _never_ get to try it, so it would be unfair of you to force one of us to swap with you." As an afterthought, Panda added: "Besides, it's your fault that there's nine of us making this trip, rather than seven."

Both of the two Aurors in the boat were now staring at her incredulously. So was Mr. Salty, and the other pair of Aurors who were riding on the huge octopus alongside the ferryman - Abbott and Shacklebolt, was it?

Even Oglethorpe was giving her a funny look. At least Dolores was showing her support for Panda by gazing out over the sea, ignoring the silly argument entirely.

"Seriously?!" Thriftermath cried, sitting up straight. "You think this... _Stick figure_ is the one who's causing our seating difficulties?"

An offended squawk was heard from the back of the squid. "Oi! I ain't Sticky! I's Salty!"

"Again: Broom handle." Thriftermath held up one hand, index finger and thumb curled in a circle. "Ferryman's wrists." She raised her other hand, making a similar circular gesture.

Waving a dismissive hand, Panda tutted her travelling companions. "If this had been a Muggle vessel, spiritual possession might not affect the maximum carrying capacity, but this boat is enchanted. Both real, unreal, surreal, and incorporeal passengers need to be taken into account."

Thriftermath slapped a hand over her forehead, and dragged it down over her face. " _That's_ what you were babbling about? Salty's a Ministry employee working at a high-security facility, for Morgana's sake! We scan him for thirteen different types of magical tampering and influence, every time we go on patrol here!"

"Thas's right! I ain't had the influenza in decades!" Salty shouted proudly. "It's on account of all the fresh, cold air and sea spray, washing the sickness away!"

Panda frowned. "Are you sure?"

"What, you think I skipped one of the thirteen bleedin' detection charms, last time I checked him? You think I _did_ didn't do the math right?" Thriftermath's face twisted into a savage grin. "I've _earned_ my surname, thank you very much."

Panda gave her an apologetic smile, and a small wink. "So have I, according to my husband."

She dug around in her pockets, and fished out a thaumometer. She waved the vaguely cube-shaped device in Salty's direction, studying the readings. The device emitted several odd noises while it went to work, making the other passengers wince: A long crackling _scritchety-scritch-scratch_ , a triple _mwah-wah_ , two gurgling _shhlunks_ , and a _plonggg_.

My apologies, sergeant." Panda jotted down a few numbers on a battered notepad from her pocket. "Looks like you were right about Mr. Salty... But I'm sure that _someone_ I encountered recently gave a highly anomalous reading..."

Her eyes narrowed. She glanced sidelong at the others, and then raised the thaumometer again.

"Congratulations, Salty!" Thriftermath shouted, while Panda surreptitiously swept the hand-held device in a short arc behind the back of the Auror's head. The Unspeakable's attempt at stealth was rendered somewhat of a moot point by the cube's _plonggg_ -ing and _shhlunk_ -ing. "The Department of Mysteries has given you a clean bill of health! Would you like to join us in your boat, now?"

The old ferryman stared at Panda, as she leaned out over the boat's railing to aim the _mwah-wah_ 'ing thaumometer at Shacklebolt. "Eh... On second thought, mebbe later."

Thriftermath laughed. "Oh, come on! You're not actually worried that there's some sort of undetectable, evil, magic-immune phantasm floating around possessing people, when you've got four trained Aurors here to keep you safe, are you? That's almost as daft as Dumbledore telling anyone who's willing to stand still for thirty seconds that You-Know-Who's come back from the dead!"

The constable pretended not to notice the _krrrk-krik-krik-krukkk_ noise coming from the cube being held under his nose. "Professor Dumbledore is a very wise and learned wizard, sarge. If he thinks that You-Know-Who might have found a way to cheat death, then perhaps..."

"Oh, that's not all!" Thriftermath giggled. "Haven't you heard his latest outlandish tale? Alright, here it comes: Dumbledore thinks that You-Know-Who is not only back from the dead, but he's also learned how to fly without a broomstick!"

She cackled, slapping her knee. "Can you imagine? Dumbledore wanders outside, sees a murky cloud on the sky that's getting a little too close, and goes: 'Oh, no! It looks like a short shower of Dark Lords!'"

Panda tilted her head as she considered this scenario for a moment. "Hmm... That _does_ sound rather unlikely. Although..."

Her gaze started tracking upwards, until she was staring at the gloomy cloud cover overhead. She aimed her thaumometer at the most ominous-looking cloud, and took a reading with a loud _bloorp_.

Thriftermath shook her head ruefully. "Y'know, I reckon the old barmpot must be going senile. Shame, really."

"Hem-hem." Dolores spoke for the first time since she dismounted Oglethorpe's tentacle. "If you're _quite_ finished slandering the Wizengamot's Mugwump, you should prepare to disembark."

She pointed forward, past the stern of the small boat. "We have arrived."

The craggy island that jutted out of the crashing waves ahead of them wasn't large to begin with, and most of its barren surface was trapped beneath the dour weight - figurative and literal - of the crude stone fortress hunkered down atop its back. The structure was primitive in its design, scoffing at such quaint, modern notions as "Brutalism" or "architecture", and went straight for plain, old "brutal".

With Oglethorpe's long tentacles lashing out to drag the octopus's bulk up onto the island's jagged beach, the Cyclopean tower took on an even more bestial cast. It loomed above the waves like the ebon head of a vast, primordial sea monster - the kind that native tribes might worship as a pagan god. Fitting, really; the place already had its own cemetery, a collection of human sacrifices made to feed its endless hunger.

"Welcome to Azkaban," shouted Salty the ferryman. "Second-worst holiday resort in the world!"

Creaks and thumps accompanied the cramped boat's arrival at the island's solitary jetty. The enchanted dinghy pulled itself up alongside the dock, followed by a length of rope unspooling itself and creeping sinuously up to a dilapidated wooden pole. The rope coiled around a tarnished metal ring attached to the pole, tying itself into a knot and mooring the boat.

Once Panda and the two Aurors had clambered out of the boat and onto the jetty, Panda pointed her wand at the Undersecretary still left in the dinghy, and levitated her ashore.

"This is no way for dignified witches and wizards to enter a Ministry facility," grumbled Dolores, floating slowly up onto dry land.

"Well, we can't exactly Apparate straight to the front door, Ma'am." Thriftermath drawled. "Security reasons, y'see. Wards would get in the way, and we'd just bounce off and land in the North Sea - if we're lucky."

Dolores narrowed her eyes and smiled at the pony-tailed witch. "I am well aware of the prison's Anti-Apparition wards, _Auror Sergeant_. Security concerns are hardly a valid reason not to install a simple flight of _stairs_."

Oglethorpe's passengers had already climbed off the octopus's back - Salty with an air of enthusiasm and relief, Abbott and Shacklebolt with a little more restraint and decorum. Salty hurried over to his dinghy, all but hugging and kissing it as he checked the boat over, cooing soft reassurances to it.

When he noticed the others giving him odd looks, he blushed and stood up a little straighter. "Ach, well... I'll just, eh... Wait 'ere by the boat, and make sure it's ready to sail when ye get back, aye?"

"You be sure and do that," sniffed Dolores. "I have a very busy schedule, and the Minister would be _most_ displeased if I were delayed for our meeting this afternoon, for _any_ reason."

Salty offered her an arthritic salute, and hobbled back aboard his boat.

"Well done, Oglethorpe," said Panda, patting one of the conjured animal's tentacles. "You've been a very satisfactory octopus. Wouldn't you agree, Auror Constable?"

The broad-shouldered wizard next to her frowned. "Erm..."

"In fact, I believe there is a Muggle saying that would fit an occasion like this," Panda smiled. "After Oglethorpe tried so hard to help Dolores, he deserves... Oh, what's that word...? Ah, right: _Hentai_."

The tall Auror stared at her. In the midst of the fierce North Sea winds, a faint gurgling whimper could just barely be heard. "... _Pardon?_ "

Panda raised both hands, fingers splayed. "You know, hentai? When you help someone applaud themselves, as a show of approval?" She pursed her lips. "...Mm, I suppose it might be called 'ten high', since you hold ten fingers in the air."

The Auror Constable awkwardly raised one hand, and slapped his large palm gently against one of Panda's delicate hands. "Um... I believe you mean: 'High five'."

Nodding politely, Panda clapped her hands repeatedly against the Auror's hand and Oglethorpe's tentacle, applauding them both.

"Hem-hem," said Dolores, gesturing at the fortress looming ahead. "If you're _quite_ finished...?"

It was a short walk from the beach to the gates of Azkaban proper. The delegation's members - now down to six, no matter how you counted them - made their way along the rough, narrow trail in silence.

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A/N: If you're wondering what Panda's surname might turn out to be... Let's just say that Oglethorpe is a reference to _Faery Heroes_.

Salty the Azkaban Ferryman has appeared in so many fanfics by now, it's getting hard to tell where the fanon started. He could be one of robst's creations, he could be even older than that.

A curious readership divide became apparent, after the last two chapters: FFN readers universally commented on the contents, while the readers on SB went utterly _Librarian-poo_ over accents. Thankfully, that linguistics debacle also had a silver lining; it inspired people to experiment with putting their own accents down in writing, and discuss the diverse nationalities represented amongst the readers - including such exotic locations as Norway and the Philippines. Fun stuff! Either way, thanks for all the reviews and comments, keep 'em coming!

 **xbox432:** A Worm/Twilight story could be _amazing_ , though. Imagine what Cauldron would be willing to do, if they could get their mitts on shape-shifting tribal protectors with anti-precog auras that could render the Simurgh blind and deaf... Or vials of vampire venom that could grant people a decent Brute/Mover rating, through a transformation process so excruciatingly painful it might cause a Trigger event, and is known to dramatically enhance any pre-existing "gifts" (potentially including parahuman powers)...

 **yobbin2000:** Cheers! Glad to hear that somebody's having fun with winkling out the details.

 **mackon:** Perfect! Come to think of it, Winchester III might be (a lot) stockier than Danny Hebert, but they both have some male pattern baldness going, and rather... robust temperaments. Material for a Worm/MASH cross-over, perhaps?

 **TerraBull:** Hmm... If some Dementors don't enjoy being controlled, and others _do_ enjoy it, they could be Dom-entors and Submentors.

 **twocubes:** Yes, Taylor's actions may very well have been attempted suicide-by-Dementor. Good thing her soul never left her body, or who knows what her Shard might have gotten up to in her absence! ;-)

 **All_Seeing_Eye:** Thank you, Lisa. Now, go to bed. It's long past your bedtime.

 **Ducats:** Magical beasts perform magical feats all the time, in HP canon, whether they're as intelligent as animals or people. Fire-breathing, fiery _flatulence_ , trauma-selective invisibility, high-mobility flight from a standing take-off despite having the body of a horse...

 **DustyMind:** Oh, the story has been doing its title justice since the second chapter. In fact, people keep complaining about how much the story is living up to its premise. ;-)

 **osterreicher97:** Thank you for another humongous review! Good to hear that people liked the indirect Dementor-control trick that Taylor worked out; I thought it'd be more interesting than plain Dementor-mastery, and it also allowed me to set up a reference (in a later chapter) to one of the best HP fics out there.  
Grimmauld Place might not be a great hiding place, yet. Setting aside Sirius's aversion to the place, it probably wasn't protected by a Fidelius until (in canon) some time around the summer of '95, when Dumbledore revived the Order of the Phoenix and needed a suitable HQ.  
Lockhart wouldn't necessarily be a representative example of how Obliviation victims behave - he tried to Obliviate Harry and Ron, but used a broken, Spellotaped wand that he'd stolen from Ron. Since the spell backfired, he may have scrambled his brains more than a properly performed Obliviation would.


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